Father of Mine
by Objessions
Summary: Tag to the Season Finale - Because I just can't help myself. Rated T because I have a mouth.
1. Chapter 1

_A/N - Tag to the Finale._

 _Title inspired by the Everclear song of the same name, which I have more than a few personal feelings about. I have some experience at being ditched by your dad while you're in middle school and spending most of your adult life just wondering what the hell happened. This may get a little deep, folks._

 _Standard disclaimers apply._

 _0-0-0-0-0_

Mac walked carefully down the empty hallway, taking in the damage that had been done to the ostentatious residence.

 _I know what you're thinking. And you're wrong._

 _I've never just trashed a place. What kind of tradecraft is that? I take out my phone, take pictures … I try to put things back where I've found them. Unless I want my subject to know I've been there…_

 _So when I walk into a place that's been ransacked like this, I have to think whoever left it like that wanted whoever followed him to know something. Usually that something is a casual disregard for basic human niceties… wait…what's that noise?_

Mac paused for a moment, wondering just exactly what Matty had sent him into. The idea of an administrator out on a mission should have tripped what Jack always called his 'Spidey senses', but he'd been too focused on his objective.

He almost smiled to himself thinking about the look on Matty's face when he'd known who she was meeting with and been able to call it off so he could confront her. He hoped she hadn't assumed that Riley was involved, because he wouldn't ever do that, wouldn't jeopardize Riley's career by involving her in his personal issues.

He'd done it himself. Granted, he was better at tech than he used to be purely through watching her work, but that was all it ever took to learn something new for him anyway. When he's taken out that thumb drive and told Matty what it was, she looked afraid. _Why?_ There wasn't anything on it that she should be afraid of. At least, Mac didn't think so. And she certainly wasn't afraid of him, nor should she have any reason to be. Looking back on it, he realized she was afraid for him.

That bothered him, increased his tension. All he was trying to do was quit. If anything, if she cared about him as she claimed to, him leaving a job that had him nearly killed practically every day should be a relief.

He should have told at least Jack what he planned to do, but he'd been too angry. He didn't want to even be around the people he cared about as angry as he was. Then again, he hadn't really planned to quit necessarily. If Matty had come back at his questions with something honest instead of the much beloved by the CIA Glomar Response, he wouldn't have done it. But she had. And he couldn't take any more runarounds about his father, his past, or any more denial of exactly what the people he had to trust with his life knew about it that he didn't.

Bozer had known something was up this morning, but he hadn't said anything. For as long as they'd known each other, Mac figured Boze knew his I'm about to explode and you damned well don't want to be in the blast radius face. It all could have been defused if Matty had just been honest. He didn't care about clearances at this point. This was his goddamned _life_ they were talking about.

"That weak floorboard is actually a pressure plate attached to an IED."

Mac's head snapped up.

 _I know that voice. Don't I?_

"You're lying."

"Maybe," the familiar, but also foreign, voice said with disinterest. "Take another step and we'll see."

Mac swallowed. He knew how to disarm an S-mine, or Bouncing Betty as they were more colloquially known, and a pressure plate wasn't even all that difficult to disconnect from an explosive device with someone standing on top of it. An improvised explosive device though? One he was standing on top of himself? That would be risky as hell. And he thought the guy was bluffing, but did he really want to take that chance? _That son of a bitch…_

"What do you want?" the man asked with mild annoyance in his tone.

 _Okay, fine._ Whether he was standing on a bomb or not suddenly mattered very little to Mac. The last two years had been filled with so much tension, danger, betrayal, he just didn't care about anything other than putting a stop to it. "Director Webber sent me here to speak with Oversight."

The the man turned, and Mac realized why the voice had been familiar. His stomach dropped and he went cold all over.

"Dad?"

 _Damn it! I never meant to say that out loud. I always meant to call him Jimmy if I ever saw him again. That's what Gramps called him when he was mad and it always irked him. I could tell._

Mac tried schooling his features into a neutral expression but knew he was failing miserably. An instant later, everything went sideways and his father shouted, "Duck!"

Then things got a depressing familiar feel; gunfire, being hauled roughly to his feet, and sprinting like his life depended on it, because it did. Yeah, he'd never wanted to quit more than he did right then. But, his feelings would have to wait. Whatever had been in that safe had been important to the guy with the heavy weaponry because he was already in hot pursuit.

Mac keyed his Jeep to life and gunned it out of the driveway while Oversight was still climbing in on the passenger side. Several more shots rang out and Mac saw one ricochet off the pavement near his front driver's side tire. Never had he wished for Jack Dalton in the passenger seat instead of who was currently occupying it more than he he did right then.

0-0-0

Mac didn't know it, but at that moment Jack was sure as hell wishing he was wherever Mac was, too. Jill had been the one to tell them. Well, she asked Bozer what was going on with Mac and when Mac's roommate looked both concerned and confused, she'd revealed that the rumor was Mac had quit.

Bozer had immediately called Jack, who was at the range doing his monthly qualifier, and then Riley, who'd been taking a relaxing personal day with Billy, up to the point where Bozer had practically shouted into the phone asking if she knew what was going on with their friend.

Now that he knew what happened, Bozer was as close to freaking out for Mac as he ever got. There was more going on here than Mac making a snap decision to quit a job that Bozer knew meant the world to him. "You're the Director of the Phoenix Foundation. If you don't have the authority, who does?"

Jack was the only one to pick up the slight flicker of something like pity in Matty's face when she said, "Oversight. And that's exactly who I sent Mac to see."

Jack's expression morphed from being purely furious at whatever had gone down between Mac and Matty that would have made him quit without talking it over with the rest of his team, to being flat out scared for his partner. Matty looked … worried. Really worried. And Matilda Webber wasn't one to worry about something that was already over. Whatever was going on, Mac needed his partner right now, Jack was sure of it.

"Then where the Hell is Oversight?"


	2. Chapter 2

Mac had been accused of distracted driving more than once. Usually by Bozer or Jack. So, as he zipped in between another set of cars that were really too close together and then cut off the lead car, he had about a half second where he was glad they weren't with him. Because never had he been more distracted.

The man sitting next to him, craning his neck occasionally to see the car pursuing them was entirely focused on the guy chasing them. Mac was all too used to carrying on with the business of sorting out his life while also completing a mission, and was only about half paying attention to the person speeding to catch up with them.

Mostly he was caught up in a sort of shocked, slow burning, fury, directed not at the man trying to put a bullet into him, but at the man who'd watched that happen more than once and was usually the one to send orders for him to head back out into the field before the bandages were off.

"He's still back there," Oversight announced, as though it wasn't readily apparent.

He might have had to put up with that condescending crap when he was nine, but he sure as hell didn't now. "Thanks for pointing out the obvious," Mac snapped. He tossed the man a brief glare. "So you're Oversight, huh?"

As he let some of what was running through his head out of his mouth, he felt himself grow even more annoyed. Oversight barely spared him a glance, instead focusing on whatever he was doing. Which, Mac suddenly noticed, was writing on the dash of his Jeep. In permanent freaking marker, by the way. Then a bullet shattered his back window, making a little bit of pen on the interior the least of his worries.

"You might want to accelerate."

God damnit.

Mac had always thought maybe he was remembering this man too harshly, thought maybe the bossy, superior, snappish tone that he recalled was just his anger, his feelings of abandonment, but no. As usual, his memories had been 4K video accurate.

"Thanks for the advice," he bit out with less than subdued sarcasm. "Dad," he added with a little venom.

Venom was the right word, too. He felt like if he didn't spit out some of the poisonous anger that had started simmering when Oversight had first turned indifferently to look at him and was now at a full rolling boil, it was going to poison him, was already affecting his judgement. He swerved just in time to avoid another car.

Now that he'd started, he found he couldn't stop. "So how long have you been in charge of Phoenix?"

He didn't know what he'd been hoping for, but when Oversight … and that's how he was still thinking of him … even when he said 'Dad' it didn't have affection or warmth in it - was more of a weapon than anything … when he revealed that he'd been in charge since long before Mac ever came to work there, Mac felt a little sick to his stomach.

His first thoughts that Oversight was an unfeeling bureaucratic machine who'd practically shoved him from one brush with death to the next and that that emotionless bastard had been his father had been correct. Mac usually enjoyed being right.

Now, he would have given anything to hear he was wrong, that the Oversight who had Thornton recall him to duty after Lake Como a month shy of completing his rehab hadn't been the same guy who'd taught him to read, had taught him his first lessons in force and motion … had occasionally behaved like an actual father.

Once again though, this man was responsible for Mac looking down the barrel of a gun. Fortunately for both of them, even highly distracted, Mac was just good at what he did, at making life saving snap decisions. As he got them momentarily out of harm's' way, mostly by driving like Jack, he finally asked what was really going on. Personal stuff could continue to be dealt with, but since trying to quit appeared to have already turned into a mission, Mac acknowledged the need to divide his attention productively.

When his father said, "Eyes on the road, Angus," Mac had had enough. He slammed on the breaks. You wanna do things all your way, huh Dad? How about we try things my way?

He was happy his voice sounded as dispassionate as he'd hoped for, despite his wildly hammering heart, when he said, "We're not going anywhere until you answer my questions."

The fact that his father once again did what Mac was all to used to and tried to make his desire to be heard, to be answered, an objective problem, rather than the subjective human experience it was was all Mac needed to pull a move that, he had the fleeting thought, Jack would have loved. He slammed the Jeep into reverse and floored the accelerator.

Oversight's response did not disappoint. And the fact that Mac never wavered, never decelerated clearly bothered the older man. Mac could almost hear Jack's reaction. 'Hot damn, Mac that was some Indy 500 shit right there!' probably followed by a loud and raucous, 'Whooohooo!' and a fist bump. Oversight was, instead, a little pale, but got out of the Jeep without further comment.

His assessment of the injured goon and then his response to Mac's question about it caused Mac's face to pull further into the irritated skeptical expression that was starting to hurt his head. This guy lied more easily than he breathed. And it made Mac wonder, just for the moment that Oversight was on the phone, just how many times he'd lied that easily to him … to his mother.

When Mac heard the words, "Thank you, Director Webber," Mac felt his stomach drop again, and once again he felt like the ambient temperature had dropped about fifteen degrees. The realization that came with those words made him feel that not only had the air grown suddenly cold, but that he'd also swallowed a block of ice. Possibly made from Coke and Poprocks.

"Matty knew where you were the entire time, and neither of you bothered to tell me?"

It was less a question and more of an accusation.

And Mac felt completely trapped by his father's response. Come on this mission with me, and maybe, if you're lucky, I'll answer some of your questions. Mac swore to himself again. It was always quid pro quo with this man. James MacGyver never offered anything out of affection or the goodness of his heart. If you got something from him, it was bought and paid for.

When Mac was very small it was memorizing little things. Then it was reading, doing math, finally grades. But never so much as an 'I love you' was ever offered freely. Mac had the melancholy thought that if this man's love was always that selfish, his mother must not have thought very much of herself if she was with him.

As Mac climbed back into his Jeep, following Oversight's lead, he wondered if his own self-concept was as strong as he told himself it was, because he seemed helpless to refuse. His desire to have even a partial answer was stronger than his self-respect or his righteous anger at the moment.


	3. Chapter 3

Mac sighed softly to himself as he pulled off the road at a trailhead where some unsuspecting hiker had left their car parked. He hoped they had a reasonably full tank of gas, because he was only willing to siphon some off if it wasn't going to leave them stranded out here. This wasn't his mission.

In fact, Mac wasn't a hundred percent convinced this was a mission at all. Matty had called what Oversight was off doing a 'project' and then there was the very deliberate way the man kept calling him son, and using his given name, in the same tone that used to elicit a compliant 'Yes, sir' when he was a kid. He felt less like he was on an assignment and more like he was being tested.

The expression said that based on the current test, when his gas light came on, he was being found wanting. Then as Mac started to get some back flow out of the sedan he was trying to take a little gas from, Oversight let a small, almost inaudible humph.

Mac's eyes flicked to Oversight's face.

"What is it?"

He knew, but he wanted wanted to make his father confirm his suspicions. That he was always testing, always judging. It's what he always did.

"Nothing," he said unconvincingly.

Mac felt his jaw tighten uncomfortably.

"You're lying," he accused.

He realized it was the second time he'd said that exact sentence to his father in less than an hour.

"I'm just surprised you left home with a half-empty tank of gas."

Mac's jaw tightened further, making his teeth hurt at the mention of the Boy Scouts.

"I came prepared," he asserted, and then decided it sounded defensive, sounded like he was trying to prove himself in some way. He didn't want to do that, didn't want this man to know that what he thought still mattered. And it did. That bothered Mac almost more than the revelation that his father had been in the same building as him more days than he hadn't for the last five or so years and had never so much as dropped him a note.

"I quit the Boy Scouts a few months after you left," he said.

Quit felt better than 'got kicked out'. To be fair, Mac thought, he hadn't precisely gotten kicked out, more invited to leave. And he had. Gladly. His father telling him about communicating with his grandfather irked him. It was said in a tone implying he and Gramps had been conspiring behind Mac's back. Mac had known Harry talked to his father at least a few times. When he'd confronted him he'd had to admit it too, but he hadn't wanted to. Mac always felt weirdly like Gramps was trying to protect him from his father. When James suggested that he'd arranged for Mac to work for him, Mac started to understand why his grandfather had been so protective.

That suggested a kind of manipulation that made Mac intensely uncomfortable.

When the classic blue sports car he'd been helping Jack restore over the last few months pulled up Mac felt almost sick. "Jack?" There was an immediate sense of impending doom that settled into the pit of his stomach and he glared at Oversight, demanding to know, "Does he know, too?"

He didn't want to believe that Jack could possibly be part of what increasingly felt like a bizarre conspiracy, but he hadn't wanted to believe that Matty was either. And he had incontrovertible proof that she'd been lying to him for almost two years.

He'd known Jack since Afghanistan, had trusted him with his life more times than he could count … But he could see how Jack could be part of it. He and Matty had worked together at CIA and … He realized his thoughts were spiraling away from him, into wild speculation. That was no way to get to the bottom of anything.

He tried to call up Alfred Pena's quietly reassuring voice. "No feelings about the bomb, Mac." That's what this was. A time bomb, ticking down to destroy his life as he knew it.

When it became clear that they didn't know each other, that Jack was just his partner, his friend, and that he was here just because he'd been worried for him, something inside Mac loosened and he found he could speak again. When Jack pulled his hand back from offering to shake with Oversight, Mac almost smiled. He wanted to apologize to Jack for even thinking he could be involved in his father's subterfuge. But he knew what Jack would say. The same thing he always said when Mac struggled to trust, to be even a little vulnerable. Something like, "It's alright, kid, that ginormous brain of yours is just givin' itself a wedgie again. You got so much extra brain, no wonder it gets all tangled up on itself sometimes."

Mac appreciated, more than he could ever say, that Jack wasn't inclined to just go along with what Oversight was cooking up. He appreciated Jack asking questions. Despite his anger, despite his age, despite the intervening years that should have robbed James MacGyver of any authority over his son, Mac found he was having a hard time pushing back against the plans his father had for them. With Jack here asking the questions he also wanted answers to, Mac found it easier to find his voice.

Of course, it's not like Oversight was terribly forthcoming with important information. He gave them just enough to pique their curiosity, a habit that Mac was more than familiar with. But since it didn't feel like the kind of job he could say no to just because he was pissed off, he found himself climbing back into his damaged Jeep wondering, not how to get more information out of his father, but how in the hell he was going to get across the Mexican border with a car full of bullet holes and covered in broken glass.

Then it became clear that they were just headed to a small private airport outside Los Angeles where one of Phoenix's jets was waiting. Jack took in the speculative looks Oversight was giving Mac as they rode toward the airport. Mac pretty clearly noticed it too, but didn't say much.

Sitting behind Mac as they drove along allowed Jack to see the tension in his partner's shoulders as it ratcheted up. Jack wondered exactly what had gone down between these two before Riley had found Mac and he'd caught up. He also wondered why Matty hadn't tried to stop him from chasing after Mac. That wasn't like her. Then Jack had the disturbing thought that Matty clearly thought Mac needed his protection along for this little reunion. _Hmmm._

The flight took less time than a commercial one would have, but Jack was still mentally hurrying the plane along. The awkward tense silence that stretched out between father and son was painful to be a part of. Mac was never particularly chatty on a flight, he was usually focused on briefing materials on the way in or trying to catch a nap or patch himself up on the way out, but in this situation Jack figured he'd at least try finding out more about what was going on en route to their destination in Mexico City.

No such luck.

Mac sat in stony silence, mutilating paperclip after paperclip that he pulled out of his pocket.

Finally, Oversight spoke. "Haven't you outgrown that habit yet?"

Mac shrugged. "I can't see how it's hurting anything, or why you'd care."

"It's childish and unproductive," his father replied curtly.

Mac's brow furrowed. "You banned them from the office, not Webber." It wasn't a question.

"No one bans office supplies in an office," he said with cool indifference. "I just suggested they be used for their intended purpose, rather than frivolity."

Mac bit down on any reply. Instead he got out his phone and started playing a logic puzzle game. Jack was sitting close enough that he could see Mac making the sorts of mistakes he almost never did sorting it out, but at least it gave him something to do with his hands that didn't draw comment from Oversight. Jack could also see Mac's eyes in a way he knew Oversight couldn't, because Mac was letting his hair hang down in his face a little. Something he hadn't been prone to doing in years.

There was pain in that blue gaze that ran deeper than the anger that sparkled on its surface.

Jack had the feeling when Mac finally let it out, things were going to get ugly.

Mac glanced at him, almost like he'd heard what Jack was thinking, and offered him a small smile. Whatever happens, the smile said, I'm glad you're here.

Me, too, kid, Jack thought. Me, too.


	4. Chapter 4

The closer they got to the address that Oversight had discovered when he found that Chinese menu, the quieter Mac got. And Oversight got quieter in response to that. It was worrying the hell out of Jack. An admin who didn't want to talk at you about the job or tell you how to do it whether they really knew or not was disconcerting. And a Mac who didn't ask a million questions or explain everything he was thinking was, to Jack, downright scary.

When Mac didn't talk, Jack didn't know what to expect from him. He couldn't protect the man if he had no idea what he might do next, and Jack was feeling more protective than usual. He actually thought about saying that out loud because he thought that, at least, would get a reaction out of Mac that he could do something with. When they entered the warehouse, Jack pushed in front of both of the others, frowning at the fact that Mac's father didn't seem to be carrying a weapon either.

Then, the unpredictability Jack had been worried about reared its head, as Mac crashed through a window, tackling the retreating drug dealer that was their best lead at the moment. Jack could see from a troublesome distance away that there was more than a simple wrestling match going on between Mac and the bad guy too. That was a knife, no question.

Jack arrived in time to make sure the worst of the tussle resulted in Mac being just winded instead of bleeding, since only a fool kept trying to have a knife fight with a guy drawing down on them with a semi-automatic.

Mac caught his breath while Oversight bound the other man's hands with his belt. Mac's dive through that window and dust up with the guy he'd been chasing reminded him that he still had fading bruises from their trip to Puerto Rico and tangling with those bank robbers. Say nothing about the additional ones he'd earned taking off immediately following getting Carlos home to his family on another mission in Pakistan that Matty said was Oversight's top priority.

Being reminded that not only had they not had half a minute to catch their breath between what happened with Carlos and being sent off to Pakistan, combined with the twinges from his yellowing bruises, tipped Mac out of annoyed territory and back into seriously pissed off. So when his father asserted, "I'd like to say I taught my son everything I know," Mac couldn't quite stop himself from coming back with, "That'd just be another lie though, wouldn't it?"

It got no real response out of Oversight. Not that he'd really expected one, but it still irritated him.

Jack met his eyes for a split second and Mac gave him the barest of nods, one that said, go ahead, get this refocused on the mission would you, because I can't and I want this over with.

So that's what Jack did. Mac was starting to sort of get into the flow when their subject revealed they were once again dealing with La Ola. Mac's eyes flicked to Oversight's face at that revelation, but the man's impassive expression revealed nothing.

After all the lies Mac had already catalogued though, he was now even more suspicious. The fact that La Ola had come up again made him wonder vaguely if his encounter with them at Christmas had been some kind of test. Can this kid keep it together if someone comes knocking at his actual door instead of one belonging to a carefully backstopped cover identity?

When Murdoc has done it, Mac felt like he'd handled himself more than adequately. But Mac could see someone who really wanted to take his full measure wondering what his response would be if the good guys were the ones who showed up. Mac hadn't given it much thought before now. But he supposed he'd been distracted by what happened to Cage … Then the Ghost showing up. Mac shook off those intrusive thoughts.

If it had been one of his father's strange trials by fire, Mac thought that was one he'd passed with flying colors. Then he shook his head, biting the inside of his cheek. That was all so paranoid. Instead of letting this man get to him, like he'd always been able to, Mac decided to take the reins and start asking some real questions. "What's going on? What did Walsh do to you?" Mac demanded.

Mac frowned at the way his father's eyes slid to Jack when he revealed that Walsh had been, for all intents and purposes, his own partner and friend, his overwatch, so to speak. Mac glanced at Jack, too, wondering what he was making of all of this. When Oversight walked away, Jack observed almost sympathetically, "Basically this is like you hunting for me."

Mac frowned and nodded. "Sort of, I guess," he acknowledged and started to walk away.

"What do you mean you guess?" Jack asked.

Mac didn't really look at him. "I mean, I wonder what would have driven Walsh to change teams," he answered with a shrug, his implication that perhaps his father had something to do with why someone would go bad hanging in the air. It felt like a petty thing to say. He also didn't feel like taking it back at the moment.

Besides, Mac thought, swallowing hard, he'd tried to push his own partner away often enough. He heard his grandfather's voice almost whispering in his ear about how brains like that came with a price. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and sighed. That was one he really wasn't interested in paying.

0-0-0

Mac kept getting the idea, however vague, that Jack was trying to put the brakes on their continued participation in this mission. He kept pointing out little flaws in the half-assed plan to go after Walsh, like the strategic disadvantage the mercenary's hideaway location would put them at. He's also tried suggesting calling Tactical in several times, but his suggestions fell on deaf ears. Oversight wasn't letting anything get in the way of how he wanted to do things.

Jack kept looking at Mac in a way that said, "Say somethin' ya big dumb genius. This is gettin' stupid kinds of dangerous." And Mac had gotten past being either totally silent or occasional sniping at his father. He was putting his two cents in here and there, but Jack thought if anyone else had just tried to sweep Mac into a mission with this little intel, this little back-up, he'd probably have told them to go to hell.

When Oversight suggested an approach to the La Ola compound where Walsh was supposedly holed up, Mac had nodded thoughtfully and gotten out his phone. He scrolled through a search for a moment or two, then offered, "There's a place that rents ATVs to tourists about four blocks that way." He waved in a general southerly direction.

Oversight shook his head. "Too noisy. We'll just borrow of few mounts from that big ranch we saw on our final approach. We'll get a lot closer on horseback before anyone could notice us." He was headed in the direction of their rental car less than a second later.

Mac rolled his eyes and grumbled half under his breath, "Horses are noisy."

Jack clapped him on the shoulder. "We can get out of here any time you want, Mac. This ain't exactly an official mission."

Mac shrugged and started off in the same direction his father had gone. "And I haven't exactly gotten any straight answers. I'm not letting him out of my sight again until I do."

Jack just nodded, but of course hadn't really thought Mac meant it literally. It became clear to him pretty quickly though that he had. Once they had, as Oversight put it, 'acquired' some horses and set off into the woods, Mac dropped back to the rear.

Jack kept casting concerned looks back at his partner, but Mac's expression said pretty clearly that he wasn't up for conversation, and he was watching Oversight with wary watchful eyes. Looking back over his shoulder, Oversight made a casual, seemingly offhand, comment that he was surprised after all the lessons his son could still be such a tentative rider.

Mac just glared in response.

In truth he'd despised the riding lessons he'd been forced into at least as much as being signed up for Boy Scouts without being consulted. More actually. To a little kid, the back of a horse felt suicidally high off the ground.

However, in the intervening years, he'd come to enjoy the occasional trail ride, or on a few notable occasions, rides on the beach with some pleasant companionship, which were about as cliche as you could get, but there was something endearing about that at the right time, too.

He knew he was a decent rider. Of course, he also had to acknowledge that his horse seemed ill at ease under him today. He suspected it sensed his turbulent mood and didn't trust him to be in charge. He shifted in the saddle and sighed. He didn't know that he trusted himself at the moment, so that was probably fair.

Mac was chewing on some sort of adequate response to the implied criticism when Jack sort of saved the day with a renewed bout of Jack-chatter. Mac understood Jack's question about what to call Oversight for what it was: tension-breaking teasing. From his father's response, Mac realized that maybe he wasn't the only MacGyver who occasionally struggled with people skills.

"Well, since this is an official mission," he paused and Mac saw one of Jack's eyebrows climb at the statement. "And I am your boss, Dalton, how about, sir?"

Jack's face asked plainly, "Since when is this an official mission?" but what came out of his mouth instead was, "Sir, yes sir," in a tone that conveyed he preferred to save that form of address for officers who'd earned it and he wasn't convinced this guy had the chops. "That'll work," he concluded. He'd given the man a chance to be a little human and as far as Jack was concerned his response hadn't necessarily passed the smell test.

He'd have to try a more direct route.

"But just so you know, your son spent the last fifteen years wondering why you just up and bailed on him, so you might want to clear that up."

He smirked in response to the glare Oversight directed his way and dropped back to see if he could get Mac talking. The only possible good that could come of this would be Mac finally have some sense of peace about his father from finally having some answers. He couldn't get them unless he started really asking, because it was clear his father wasn't going to just offer him any.

Mac gave an indifferent shrug at Jack's suggestion that he try talking to his father, but his head snapped around quickly when Jack also suggested that the personality traits that had Mac so twisted up were the ones he shared. So that was it, Jack thought. Mac was worried that he's like his father and every insignificant thing he disliked in the man were things that suddenly seemed like glaring character flaws he could see in himself. So Jack decided to default to funny. "Can you imagine if I went bad and you had to hunt me down?"

Mac smirked. "I mean, I'd catch you in like a day."

That was better. Mac sounded almost normal. "You wish," Jack said with a derisive snort.

"At most."

They bantered back and forth and Jack could see Mac had forgotten to be wound quite so tight for a minute, which meant his thinking was as clear as it was going to get, so he suggested that he try talking to his father again. Mac rolled his eyes. He hated it when Jack was right. He hated it even more when he had no idea what to do about it.

Mac jigged his horse forward a little faster and caught up to his father. If he didn't Jack would just keep bugging him anyway. This was easier than Jack nagging him, he told himself. Still, he didn't know what to say, so focusing on the mission seemed like the way to go. That was sort of neutral ground, he supposed.

He regretted it the moment his father revealed that he'd been responsible for them being assigned together in Afghanistan. Mac threw an almost wild eyed look at Jack, who, thankfully, looked as surprised and irritated as he felt. Pulling strings … a phrase Oversight kept using … was starting to make Mac feel like a puppet on the end of them.

He appreciated Jack's response more than he could say.

"Okay, now, you might've arranged the meeting, but our friendship was galvanized through hardship.  
We did that on our own."

That summed it up exactly.

Neither one of them had been thrilled with their partnership early on. They were very different people, and Mac had been in almost constant sleepless agony over his mentor's death, so he had to admit to being even more emotionally unavailable than usual at the time. But getting damn near blown up together, talking to each other in the dark under fire, doctoring the world's worst MREs that you had to shovel in fast if you didn't want to eat more dirt than salty whateverthehell, well, it went a long way toward breaking down walls on both sides of the relationship.

That seemed to put an end to Oversight's current flow of information though. Since he wasn't going to comment further on Mac and Jack independently deciding to keep working together, Jack decided to see if he could get any more information on what they were walking into. Exactly how unhappy to see James MacGyver was this Walsh guy gonna be anyway?

"So what exactly happened between you and Walsh? Huh?"  
Oversight didn't look left or right when he replied colorlessly, "I wish I knew."  
Mac didn't know if he was buying the story his father was telling. Mostly because he thought if he or Jack just disappeared it wouldn't have taken either of them months to find out what happened. Hell, they'd had a pretty bad fight in Paris, with Mac basically telling Jack to leave him the hell alone, and when Murdoc had grabbed him, Jack was already looking, was on the trail of finding him less than two hours later.

There was one thing his father said that rang true though. Because if James MacGyver had ever agreed to work with Jonah Walsh at all, Mac was sure the guy was as good as they came.

"He was one of our most talented operators. Now he's one of our most dangerous enemies."

He and Jack shared a look behind James' back.

This wasn't going to be pretty. 


	5. Chapter 5

There was starting to be some legitimate back and forth between Mac and … Well, Jack hadn't exactly decided what to call the man yet. Out loud 'Sir', or more entertaining 'Sir Oversight Sir', was just fine, but every time he saw pain and anger flash in Mac's eyes Jack had an overwhelming urge to call him something a hell of a lot less respectful.

However, for the moment, Jack was trying to reserve judgement. For starters, he couldn't exactly deck the boss or call him an asshole and expect to keep paying his rent. Also, this had to be about what Mac wanted and needed to get out of this situation. Jack's own parents had done their share of screwing up and Jack counted himself as one of the privileged few that had a chance to settle that up while they were all still on this Earth.

He knew how Mac's brain worked.

If something happened to the old man and Mac hadn't found some resolution, he'd torture himself with that for the rest of his life. Although, it meant dealing with his feelings. Something Mac was almost always loathe to do.

Mac kept glancing at Jack, his eyes almost asking Jack to just do what he did and jump in and be funny, or ridiculous, or get all serious-operator-totally-mission-focused, so he wouldn't have to do this. And while Jack could sympathize, even relate a little bit, that wasn't going to help. Jack started to let his horse drop back, then when its natural inclination seemed to be to keep pace with the other animals, Jack pulled back on the reins, ever so slightly, falling back, and giving Mac and his father some space.

They rode that way for a while. Mac kept looking back with increasing frequency, and more than a growing amount of discomfort. After another ten minutes, Mac glanced back again, frowning, so Jack made a face and shifted uncomfortably in the saddle, hoping to believably explain the distance he was putting between them.

"You alright?" Mac called out with genuine concern.

Jack pulled a pained expression. "Yeah ... Yeah … My, uh, my butt's just getting a little numb."  
Mac's frown deepened. Jack had taken a couple of legitimately hard hits last week in Pakistan and had fallen probably eight feet flat onto his back. Of course he'd said he was fine, avoided getting it x-rayed, and gone about his business like everything was totally normal, but Mac had noticed him limping a few times and now he wondered if Jack had actually hurt himself. Well, more than their standard levels of tell-me-why-I-do-this-job-again pain. "Well, you want to take a break?" he offered.

"No, I don't need to take a break," Jack replied, wanting them to keep things moving, conversationally and in a mission-direction that got them home sometime soon. Then James offered an amused suggestion that a break was fine with him.

Jack glared. Then he met Mac's eyes for a second. They said, 'Either let's take a break so I'm not trapped next to this guy talking at me about how disappointed he is that I dropped out of one thing after another that he thought was a good idea, or you get up here and do that distracting thing you do that I usually yell at you about. Jack tipped him just a slight nod that no one else, including the man scrutinizing both of them could have picked up.

"Hey, people born in Texas do not need to take saddle breaks, okay? Sir Oversight." Jack nudged his horse to pull in between them. "Hey, you know, while we're at it, maybe you could help me out with a little something."

Oversight nodded.

"All this stuff that's going on with Matty, the file on you, days in interrogation, why was she investigating you?" Another amused, superior look at both of them. "Because I asked her to."

He was explaining the evolution of his relationship with Director Webber, when Mac interrupted, "Right after that, you left home and you never came back."

What sounded an awful lot like kind of pitiful justifications followed Mac's pained observation. Then James spoke again, more seriously, but without looking at Mac, despite the fact that his son's gaze was fixed on his face with a peculiar intensity. "I'd already lost your mother. I wasn't about to risk losing you."

Mac nodded slowly, then said calmly, "Okay, so that's why you left." He paused and Jack could tell, even though he'd dropped back a little again, that his partner was swallowing hard. Jack also knew from the sudden squaring of Mac's shoulders, and the deliberate way he turned his head back toward his father that Mac was about to say something he didn't want to say, but that needed to come out, because he simply couldn't keep it in anymore. "I'll still never understand why you left without saying good-bye."

Mac looked away from his father again by the time the sentence was all the way out of his mouth, not even straight ahead, but sort of off the the side. His horse even listed that way a little. James finally looked Mac's way, but Mac wasn't turned in that direction to see him, and Jack was almost glad. In profile at least, the man's face in response to his son's almost plea, for an explanation of the thing that clearly hurt worse than the leaving itself, was nearly blank and certainly devoid of any remorse or other (in Jack's mind anyway) appropriate emotion.

Then, James shouted, "Come on," and kicked his horse carelessly to send it into a run. Jack was both surprised and annoyed at James MacGyver's sudden departure from the conversation.  
When Mac realized what was actually going on, on the other hand, he was actually relieved.

Back to the mission.

He could use his familiar tool of boxing up his feelings for now and focus on the task at hand. He was good at that.

He and Jack hurried to catch up.

From his position on the ground, Oversight ordered, "Dalton, sweep the perimeter. Take out any more lookouts."

Jack was good with orders that made sense. "Yes, sir," he acknowledged, tilting his head a little to let Mac know what direction they were going to head in.

Oversight cut off their non-verbal planning with a curt, "Angus and I are gonna continue to the compound."

Mac looked almost confused for a moment, not quite certain if he wanted to balk and follow Jack or obey an order from the guy he'd tried to tell was no longer his boss. Mac's horse circled around once as pensive and uncertain as he was. Finally, Mac nudged the animal gently in the direction his father was taking off in.

He decided to ignore the fact that the man was determined to call him Angus even though he'd been asking him not to since he was seven, to ignore how highjacked into this mission he felt, and to ignore his earlier impulse to quit. This was a real mission, he hadn't actually quit, and Jack was here caught up in it too. Best to finish the job. And maybe he'd get the answers he wanted before it was all over.

If not, there was always the debrief back at the office.

One way or the other he now knew where to find his father and could talk through things that had been eating him up for most of his life. He turned his horse back onto the road to follow his father, frowning again as he realized they were heading in the opposite direction as Jack. He took a deep breath and did his best to ignore his most pressing thought of the moment.

If ever he'd needed his Overwatch, it was now.


	6. Chapter 6

Mac spent the rest of the fairly short ride to the compound just trying to keep up with his father. When he'd taken off back where they'd discovered the La Ola lookout in the woods, it had been so abrupt Mac's horse nearly startled enough to dump him out of the saddle. Fortunately, years of just trying to stay alive out in the field had left him with lightning quick reflexes, so he managed to keep his seat. The forced riding lessons from his childhood had nothing to do with him anticipating his horse's reaction either, he grumbled to himself.

Mac admitted to himself that he was probably an above average amount of touchy at the moment anyway. He didn't want to be here, didn't want to be on the job for people, for an organization he didn't trust, and here he was sucked right into a mission he knew only the barest details of; details he wasn't willing to think of as facts either. Just because James MacGyver declared a thing to be so, did not, in Mac's mind, make it true or even plausible at this stage of the game.

He also hadn't wanted to split up with Jack.

First of all, Jack hated splitting up; usually he raised holy hell if it was necessary on a mission, and especially since Murdoc had doubled down on making Mac a target … Okay, since he'd kidnapped and tortured him … but Jack didn't usually put it that way. Mac was usually the one to just say it out loud, to put words to what had happened, as if to prove that it didn't bother him. Both he and Jack knew that was a lie, but it was one they were comfortable maintaining.

Then there was the fact that Jack hadn't balked when Oversight had given the order. Mac could tell Jack didn't care for his father. That whole Sir Oversight thing was a pretty open dig. But that was as far as his challenging the man went. He had given Mac a number of sympathetic looks, but other than that he had backed right off from his usual … being Jack.

Mac nudged his horse along a little faster, although it didn't really catch him up to his father, just got him a little closer so he could see the man's body movements enough to anticipate when he might turn or stop, since he hadn't exactly communicated after giving them both their orders. Having to focus on the ride actually opened up his thoughts a little.

Suddenly he thought he understood what was going on with Jack.

Other than jokingly (mostly) talking about Jack being a helicopter parent, they never really talked about the role Jack had come to fill in his life.

Jack was one of his closest friends, certainly; in some ways closer even than Bozer, because he absolutely trusted Jack with his life, and had been willing to give his own to preserve Jack's on more than one occasion. He and Bozer were still new to the 'in the field' dynamic and Mac was still learning to trust Bozer out there. And Jack was more often than not the annoying big brother of the group. They teased him and called him the crazy uncle or sometimes even the decrepit grandpa, but big brother was frequently Jack's default role with the whole team; protector, caregiver, and more often than not designated pain in the ass. But in their own ways, the team acknowledged these roles in one way or another, even Jack.

What they didn't discuss was just how frequently Jack had filled the 'parent' role in Mac's life, at least as much as he did in Riley's, with no joking helicopter as any part of it. It wasn't really all that annoying, nor was it disrespectful of the fully functioning adult Mac was, but sometimes Mac needed advice, needed somebody to pull him up short, and every so often, needed somebody's shoulder to cry on, so to speak, needed somebody to care for him with no expectations.

Mac had the sinking feeling that he knew why Oversight had clammed up when Jack had asserted that their relationship developed independent of his "arranging things". Oversight watched them closely enough to know who they were to each other, and he didn't care for it. And Jack being Jack, with his ingrained, family-is-everything Texas upbringing wouldn't want to step on his father's toes unless or until Mac decided it was okay to step on them and said so. Explicitly.

Mac gave his father's back a hard look. He was slowing his horse now, so Mac did the same, waiting for a hint at why and not letting his own horse get too close. He didn't want to get tossed off into the brush because his father decided to pull an I've-seen-too-many-Westerns move and spook his animal again. He was going to have to figure out if he agreed with Jack's more respectful measured approach to his father or if it was, in fact, toe stepping time. Since stomping was what Mac was in the mood for without any answers, he guessed he'd better start getting some. When his father's horse halted and his started to dismount, Mac swung himself easily out of the saddle and dropped down on the ground.

James turned his horse around in the direction they'd come in and gave it a solid smack on its hindquarters to send it running, trusting it would find its way home, or not caring if it did. Mac couldn't tell from the man's expression which it was. Mac's horse pulled at the reins still in his hand so he let it go to follow the other off into the woods.

James glanced at Mac.

"Listen, Dad," Mac began, but James shushed him sharply. Mac frowned but pressed his lips together in a thin line.

James beckoned for him to follow and started off into the trees. Without the noisy breathing of the horses and the heavy clomping of their hooves, Mac could hear distant shouting, the sounds of vehicles zipping and bumping along a dirt road, and the sounds of generators or other industrial equipment. Mac closed this distance between him and his father. When he caught up to him completely, James turned and said in a low voice, "What I'm gonna need from you is …"

Mac interrupted, "How sure are you that this Walsh is here, that your intel is good?"

James arched an eyebrow. He did not like being questioned in general, and being questioned by his son seemed to be particularly galling. "Angus, I need you to trust me right now and …"

Mac's face stopped James before he could get out another word.

"Trust you? Are you serious? You've been manipulating my life for … probably all of it … and definitely since you left … and you've been my boss, watching me, practically stalking me … That feels worse than knowing what M…" He trailed off for a second. He hadn't realized that part of what was bothering him was that he'd been being watched and manipulated by Murdoc, too, and hearing that his father had been doing the same thing had him feeling kind of cold all over in a way he couldn't shake. "We're a long way from trust right now, Dad."

He bit his lip again. He didn't mean to keep calling him Dad, but it just kept slipping out. He wanted to call him Jimmy, or at least James, or maybe even Sir Oversight in the same half-amused tone Jack had been using, but he didn't seem able to break the habit of responding to that face like he was still ten.

"Angus, I understand you still have a million questions, and they deserve answers, but we just need to just get over this hill, take out a few guards, capture Walsh, and then we can sit down and have a long overdue father-son chat … Sound good?"  
Mac bit down on his natural inclination to tell him to go to hell and just bit out, "Sounds good," mostly managing to only sound about eighty percent sarcastic. Then he got a good look at the compound, "A _few_ guards?" he asked incredulously.

James actually stammered a little. "That's … uh … a few more than I was expecting."  
Mac assessed the situation with a practiced eye. "I have another question." His diamond-edged tone finally got James to look at him. Mac's expression held more pain than anger this time when he asked, "If you left all those years ago to keep me safe, why did you steer me into a profession where I nearly get killed all the time?"

James eyes widened slightly, but his expression communicated clearly that any answer he gave was not going to be satisfying. Mac stared at him for a long moment. Mac sighed and got out his pocket knife, starting to work on getting through the fence at almost the same moment as his father. He didn't know exactly what motivated James to start acting at that moment, but as for himself, Mac wanted a better look at what they were dealing with.

They slunk nearer the guarded perimeter. Mac was hardly aware that he sighed again. "Okay. So I count over a dozen cartel soldiers just in the courtyard. Two three-man teams patrolling the fence line. Seems like there's cameras at every ground level entrance, and I'm sure if we took the time to build our own thermal camera, we'd find a few more dozen cartel soldiers on the inside."

James gave him a wry smile. "Having second thoughts?"

Mac swallowed hard, controlling his breathing the way he would have if he were facing down an unknown explosive device. He wasn't having second thoughts, because he hadn't had any _first_ thoughts. He hadn't exactly accepted this mission, more been swept up in it, in a mental and emotional state that was not exactly ideal for his decision making processes. He was about to just give a dispassionate evaluation of the logistical difficulties presented by his scene assessment, but his bruised ribs from last week that had be irritated by his dive out that window and the short fight with the cartel employee chose that moment to twinge sharply and what found its way out of his mouth instead was a sharp, "I'm just trying to figure out how to get in unnoticed and avoid, you know, _dying_."

James didn't respond to Mac's implication that once again he was responsible for his son running headlong into a life-threatening situation. Instead he focused on a potential solution to the problem. When he asked a casual sounding question about potential unguarded areas, Mac couldn't refrain from glaring. "You're not quizzing me right now, are you?" The answering facial expression said that's exactly what was happening.

Mac's glare intensified, his frown morphing into an expression that felt purely angry, but had Jack been there he would have recognized it as something else. That was Mac's 'under threat' expression. Defensive, and angry certainly, but also a tiny bit fearful of falling short. Still Mac managed to let his anger win out when he answered, "Well Dad, it's not like I'm trying to learn long division. If you know the answer, save us the time and tell me." Mac let his implication that this was simply putting them in more danger for no good reason be unquestionable. James just gave him a superior looking little smirk. "It's always a lesson with you." He paused, almost hoping his father would deny it. Instead an eyebrow was raised indicating he truly expected a response. Mac huffed a loud deliberate sigh this time. "Unbelievable. The only unguarded area is the roof. Happy?" he snapped.

Mac wanted to stop the slightly warm feeling he got when his father gave him an approving little grin and pat on the arm, but he couldn't. It felt good. And he hated it for a minute, hated that almost conditioned reaction, but then they started planning an ascending rig to get onto the roof and Mac felt the familiar little thrill he'd get when he was a little kid and his dad would let him into his workshop and teach him something new, or let him use a piece of equipment or maybe even a chemical he wasn't yet familiar with, and would then praise the result. It didn't happen often. But when it did, Mac always slept better, missed his mom just a little less, felt normal, well Angus MacGyver normal. Even Boze, who definitely loved him like a brother would never have accused Mac of being normal normal. Mostly because Mac had explained physics normal when they'd met the first day of kindergarten.

Suddenly, he had the recognizably irrational urge for this mission to not just go well, but to go ideally. The part of his brain that could forget that he was pushing thirty instead of being nine, the part that was in charge when he first woke from a nightmare, the part that let those nightmares in to begin with … the part, Jack would remind him, that had experienced some pretty traumatic stuff when he was very small, wanted his father's face to light up the way it would back then and to hear his voice gain some color, lose some judgement and say the coveted words, "Good job, Angus!"

Mac started running down exactly why their on the fly plan should work.

His father raised the objection, "The only other variable are the lookouts. Unless they're neutralized, they'll notice us the moment we start rising."  
Mac shook his head, his expression looking much less stressed and upset than it had just a few moments before. This was the one part of the mission he had actual confidence in. He assured his father, "No, don't worry about that. Dalton's gonna cover. They'll never see him coming."  
Mac couldn't quite read his father's expression just then, but his reply made Mac a little worried again, though he couldn't have said why. "Well, if you trust him that much …"

"I do," he said with a curt nod, and just got up and started moving toward the first vehicle he planned to cannibalize. His father followed close behind.

The build was smooth and mostly silent. Mac looked up with slight apprehension, hoping the wear and tear on the parts he'd been able to get to didn't throw too much of a monkey wrench into the accuracy of his equations. Twenty feet wasn't really all that far … not after that goddamned balloon incident anyway, but to Mac it was kind of relative. Off the ground was off the ground, and all of it was too far. He never let it stop him from what he had to do, but his determination to not be ruled by a phobia did nothing to ease the anxiety it induced in even the most everyday situations. Add the very real possibility that someone Jack hadn't gotten to, or someone from inside coming out unpredictably saw them and took a shot at them and Mac was … twitchy … to say the least.

Seemed his father noticed, because near the top, he asked quietly, "Still afraid of heights then, Angus?"

Mac rolled his eyes. Of course. Bring that up now. Why not?

"No," he answered without further elaboration.

"Good," his father replied with something like satisfaction, whether for thinking his son had actually conquered his fear or for the desire for approval that might cause him to lie about, Mac couldn't be sure. But, now probably wasn't the time to figure that out. Mac hauled himself up onto the roof, groaning a little as it strained his myriad bruises and sore muscles from this and their previous couple of missions, but stopped himself from making any sound of discomfort as he helped his father up over the lip of the roof.

When they stood, out of sight of the guards below, James gave him an approving nod and repeated the word, "Good."

Mac grinned a little reluctantly.

That shouldn't have pleased him so much.

But it did.


	7. Chapter 7

As they made their way down from the roof, Mac was almost bothered by how few cartel soldiers they'd encountered thus far. Outside had been crawling with people, but inside was strangely, almost creepily empty. He found himself dropping into self-protective crouches around every corner and on the flight of stairs.

Part of his brain also noticed that Sir Oversight (thanks, Jack) was letting him lead the way like a goddamned human shield. After all the 'I'm still your father and I left in your best interests' bullshit Mac had been fed over the last hour or so, the fact that James let him take point rankled a little.

When they first made their way into the compound's lab, Mac wasn't surprised.

Industrial cocaine operations were a dime a dozen in cartel controlled areas here in Mexico especially, but in places like Columbia and Venezuela, too. Mac and Jack had operated in most of the places most affected by the evils of drug trafficking.

"Okay. That is a lot of coca leaves," Mac observed, not surprised, but still disappointed. His father's former partner was a common coke dealer. Apparently his father's standards weren't as high as Mac had remembered them. He commented on it in an almost disinterested way.

Then, they made their way further into the room.

Mac stopped cold.

"Oxandrolone?"

He frowned. I've never heard of using anabolic steroids to make cocaine." He looked around, increasingly confused by the environment. He was a little disturbed by the almost clinical medical setting of some areas of the clearly filthy room. It looked like a clinic. But maybe in a third world country that considered torture curative. He swallowed, for some reason a little afraid to look at his father.

"And I've got some serious questions about this gurney here."

His father's next words felt more like a confession than a revelation. "Walsh and the cartel are synthesizing drugs. Just not the one you think."

James took off at a steady clip, almost a jog, and Mac followed, feeling helpless to do otherwise. When they passed through the next set of doors, Mac was almost stopped cold by the smell.

There was the slick metallic smell of blood. A lot of it. And the sickly sweet, fetid smell of decomposition. He could feel his throat working against his natural urge to lose his in flight meal. This smell was at least eighty percent of why he'd sucked at biology in high school and in college.

He could memorize about anything, be dispassionate about even his own mortality, but the smell of decay like this (especially hidden under the unpleasant smell of chemical disinfectant) was almost more than he was built for. Give him a nice sterile lab any day of the week. Even if it was full of chemicals that could blow his face off. At least it wouldn't reek like this.

His eyes zeroed in on the blood spattered over everything, especially the wall, and the bullet casings carelessly littering the bloody floor. Whatever this was was so much worse than anything he could have imagined. His brain was already taking in further details he didn't want really want to contemplate and it made him feel sick. What the Hell ..?

Finally it found its way out of his mouth.

"What the Hell is going on here?" was spoken with slow growing horror, as his brain had already started to draw what it was certain were the logical conclusions.

James didn't answer him. Instead he just revealed that he had a copy of Riley's personal decryption key which Mac was very certain she'd never voluntarily shared with anyone. James deflected Mac's skeptical interest with a half-assed complement of Riley's talents.

But then revelations started coming hard and fast about Walsh hacking into Phoenix when Murdoc took over and stealing some formula. Mac had about enough time for even his exceptionally quick mind to think that something about that sounded off.

He wondered for a split second how Walsh could possibly have known what was going on at Phoenix enough to know a surprise attack was occurring in the building. Then he wondered if Murdoc and Walsh could be working together. Then he thought it was strange the number of times his father had brought up Murdoc. Then he was about to ask a question about all of it when something else occurred to him. "KX … KX7? What's that?"

Mac's eyes searched the information his father was speeding through on the computer as he listened to the briefest of explanations, a certainty and strange anger growing in the pit of his stomach. "Why have I never heard of this?"

James eyes flicked to Mac, then back to the screen. "Because this is what happens to people who use it."

Mac was pulled into the horror of the video of an unwilling subject being restrained and injected with the thirty-seventh attempt in a long line of gruesome failures.

Mac's mouth went completely dry, but he managed, "And you made this drug?"

It was less a question and more of an accusation, but there was no heat behind it. It was too awful to muster the necessary energy for any kind of volume or even deep emotion. He was hoping for some denial, but he was unsurprised when James simply confirmed his role in what transpired in this place, and on that video. "I did."

Mac was still trying to process the implications, to come up with some idea of what they could do, when Jonah Walsh walked into the ad hoc lab they'd broken into. As he strode closer to the pair, Mac frowned. This man looked familiar. Then he spoke. The voice was familiar, too. _But why?_ Why would anything about a man who was part of a life his father said he was protecting him from be familiar to him?

Then Walsh just made it worse, stepping deep into Mac's personal space. "You know, you probably don't remember me. You were just a kid when we met. But something tells me you're gonna remember me now."

His natural inclination was to take a step back, to maybe pull a wild-assed attempt at escape, but he felt sort of frozen by the details he was sorting though. This whole thing was surreal; from them confiscating nearly identical pocket knives from them, to Walsh revealing that he'd led James to this place.

Walsh kept shooting Mac funny little looks and Mac was thinking that the claim of choosing now to lead his father here stunk on ice. He'd had the formula for a year. Why enlist his former partner's help now? _But then again,_ Mac thought, _maybe Walsh had thought he could do this on his own._

He didn't believe for a second that Walsh recognized him from a chance encounter when he was … Mac reached back in his memory for that voice, a younger version of that face … maybe seven or eight, he decided ... either. If he knew who Mac was, Walsh had seen a more recent picture. Mac knew his eyes were distinctive, knew he resembled his father at least vaguely, but that wasn't enough.

"He wants you to finish the drug," Mac said, wishing more than ever that they hadn't split up with Jack. Jack would have been watching the door while they looked over the files on the computer and when Walsh and his cartel buddies has waltzed through the door, Jack would have dropped them like it was nothing.

He was also thinking that from the hungry sound in his father's voice when he'd been describing his research, he'd probably do it, too, just to see if he could make it work. When Walsh leveled the gun at Mac, the young man just swallowed hard. Something in his gut told him that wasn't a particularly effective lever to use on his father. He put Mac in front of a gun all the time, and had rushed him off back to work the few times that ended badly.

However, Mac was surprised when his father nodded at Walsh. "Fine," was all James said.

Walsh motioned with his gun and James preceded him out of the testing area and toward the lab, looking neither left or right when the cartel guards slammed Mac up against the nearest wall, warning him to not try anything funny in Spanish. Mac thought, in between short breaths to spare his increasingly sore torso and mentally cursing in as foul a way as his brain could come up with, that it was funny how they assumed he spoke Spanish.

Mac was straining to hear anything at all coming from the direction Walsh had marched his father off in, but couldn't make out anything more than the low mumble of Walsh's voice from the next room. Then one of the men jammed his gun hard into Mac's shoulder and shoved him in the direction his father had been taken.

Barely a minute later he heard Walsh call out, "Bring in Baby Boy," and he was pushed into the poorly equipped lab.

He was avoiding looking at his father. Agreeing to do this, hell having engaged in this kind of blatantly unethical research in the first place (no matter what story his father tried to tell himself about his motivations it was just plain wrong in Mac's mind) was the worst kind of cowardice.

Mac was more relieved than he could ever say when he heard the radio transmission that said Jack was on his way and was making life as colorful as he could out there. Then Walsh knew Jack's name, too, and Mac's smirk at thinking things were starting to look up faded into a frown.

Walsh seemed to know everything about them.

Then Walsh stopped at said, with an earnest sort of sincerity, almost regret, "Honestly, kid, I don't even know what you're doing here. What, you think you're gonna patch things up with Dad and go play catch?" Mac's eyes slid away, landed on his father, then returned to Walsh. "Come on. If you were my son, I never would've abandoned you. But when the professor here left you behind, it was like you didn't even exist. He never even mentioned your name again. Not once."

At that moment, in spite of believing him completely, and the fact that it pained him to hear, Mac knew Walsh had a very personal, very real axe to grind with James MacGyver. He wondered again just what had caused the man to abandoned his role of protecting his father and feel such clear, poisonous hatred.

Then Walsh left and Mac's father turned to him. Mac tightened his jaw. Even though he'd assumed his father hadn't spared him a thought in years, it cut surprisingly deeply to hear it from someone like Walsh and to not hear any denial, even if it was only to spare his current feelings, from his father. Mac blinked several times, knowing what the hot feeling behind his eyes meant, and he was in no circumstances ever … EVER … going to cry in front of this man.

Instead of anything that might have eased the new tension between them, his father just gave him an awkward nod, took off his jacket, started rolling up his sleeves, and said, "So, shall we get to work?"

Mac was suddenly too furious, too astounded by the cowardice necessary to comply with a request so objectionable, to even speak.

He paced for a few minutes as James started to prepare for his task until that overwhelming urge to let tears fall passed, until he had some idea of what he needed to say. When he got on top of that, he strode over to where James was working. "I'm not going to make this stuff, even if it is the only way to save my life."

"Son, I have no intention of making this stuff in order to save your life," James said cooly as he continued to mix chemicals.

"Gee, thanks, _Dad_ ," Mac snapped sarcastically, putting vicious emphasis on the word 'Dad'.  
More than his original statement, his response to Mac, was painful.

"Don't be so sensitive," he said dismissively.

 _God damn it_ , how many times had Mac heard those words in the first ten years of his life? Hearing them now was like another reminder of how easily his father had always cast off Mac's needs and feelings. Then he started to explain, as if hoping it would in some way make sense to Mac.

"I worked with Walsh for thirteen years, and trust me, he's gonna kill you whether we complete this drug or not."

Then Mac took a moment to take in the chemicals his father had assembled and he thought he had an inkling of what he might be doing. Then he reminded him of the wireless telegraph they'd build together when he was small. With a task to focus on, Mac was able to momentarily set his feelings aside and focus on acting. He gave a small smile and nod and he took the magnetic stirrer from his father.

A way to contact Phoenix.

A way to reach Jack.

A way out.

He could deal with the torrent of emotions that wanted his attention later.

Mac got to work.


	8. Chapter 8

As Mac worked to contact Phoenix, mentally crossing his fingers that they would be looking for the communication, James started amassing more chemicals, carefully measuring things into flasks with graduated cylinders.

They looked, to the uneducated eye, like they were doing what Walsh had ordered them to.

The guard was getting antsy though. He'd watched the last lab guy the cartel had brought in here for months. He'd never seen that fellow use any of what his two prisoners were working with. When he questioned them, the quick glance Mac and his father exchanged let them both know the time had come to act.

Mac looked down at the floor, not to avoid his father's eyes, but to protect himself from the carefully constructed chemical trap James had laid for the cartel guard. At the popping flash of the chemical reaction, both Mac and James sprang into action.

James incapacitated the nearest man and Mac tazed the guard that jumped into the fray from over by the door with part of his improvised telegraph. Then he disarmed him, with practiced ease and a growing sense of satisfaction. Then he had a second to really evaluate the situation.

"Okay, that's two down, but we're still trapped in here. And even if we do manage to escape this room, the place is still crawling with cartel soldiers.  
And I just destroyed our only means of communication, so what's next?"

When his father admitted to having no clear idea of what to do, Mac felt his eyes roll and his face slip into an expression he was sure he'd seen Jack wear more than once.

"Man, that is really annoying. I gotta stop doing that to people," he said more to himself than to James.

Mac thought for a second. If his father had no plan, it would be up to him. He looked around again, then he almost smiled.

"Hey, Dad, remember what I accidentally did to your tool shed when I was seven?"

James raised an eyebrow almost imperceptibly. "I'm still not sure that was an accident, but that is a good idea, son."

Mac couldn't help the slightly mischievous grin that curved his lips. Accident, not an accident, after two decades, who could say really? Well, he could. But he'd never tell.

And his father was smiling too, so either he was amused at remembering just exactly what Mac had been capable of at only seven, or he really approved of Mac's impromptu plan. Maybe even a little of both. It was the first expression Mac had noticed on his father's face that had any real color to it, and the first one that seemed genuine and warm. Mac didn't know quite what to do with how that made him feel.

But as the room began to fill with toxic chemical smoke, with shockingly hot flames, the plan seemed less like a good idea and more like a very painful, messy death, at least as bad as anything the cartel or Walsh could have come up with.

And still no sign of Jack, who he thought would have gleefully pointed out that the last time he'd set fire to a building, hoping to use it as a distraction that would lead to a means of escape, they'd had to jump four stories and count on self-inflating body bags to keep them from splattering all over the ground. Mac thought that if Jack were here and had pointed such a thing out, he would have returned something like, "Well, it worked, didn't it?" and not acknowledged how uncertain he'd been when they threw themselves out those windows. Or how uncertain he was now.

In the very likely event that they didn't make it out of here, there were just some things that needed saying. Mac finally really looked at his father.

"Okay," Mac sighed in a defeated sort of way, not quite sure why he was bothering. "If this is the way things are going, I don't think we're gonna have time for that father-son chat, so I just have one question."

He coughed then, the fumes starting to really burn with every breath, and his whole upper body protesting the act to protect itself from the distraction of the many bumps and bruises he'd sustained lately. He took a second to stifle the urge to cough again, carefully, quietly, clearing his throat.

"Why?" he finally demanded.

"I already told you why I left," James snapped, sounding immediately annoyed, almost angry.

That was such a bullshit answer. Nothing his father had said about his abrupt, hurtful, departure all those years ago made any sense. And the other things he was learning, the facts and feelings his brain was collating, the inferences he was drawing … none of that made any sense either. He couldn't keep a lid on it anymore.

"No, no!" he said with an angry shake of his head, voice rising. "If you wanted to protect me from the dangers of this life, then why did you bring me into it?"

Looking panicked for a split second, as though he hadn't expected Mac to revisit this question, James fumbled for a moment, then stuttered, "Because even though I knew it wasn't safe for you to be near me, I-I couldn't let you go … At least this way I could be with you, watching over you."

Mac's disbelief, his fury that his father would try to stick to this lame story, contorting his face. He swallowed hard, suppressing another cough. At least he could blame his watering eyes and burning throat that strained his voice on the fire now. At least he could have if the pain, the accusation, the fact that he was so near tears, hadn't been so evident when he spoke.

"Dad, you weren't with me, you left me. You left me. And you know what, if you wanted to, you could have taken me with you anyway. You could have protected me from anyone."

Something in James MacGyver seemed to snap.

"It was me, it was me I was protecting you from!"

He advanced on Mac, and Mac took an involuntary step back, still angry but almost afraid, and unable to keep the expression from his face.

"Your mother's death changed me. It made me so angry all the time."

Mac didn't know what to think, so he just stared back at his father, feeling betrayed, feeling angry, but most of all feeling a growing sadness deep in his chest that he didn't think he'd felt since the day of his mother's funeral.

"I did ... I didn't know how to relate to you anymore," he stammered. "You were such a brilliant kid."

That sounded real enough, Mac thought. There had always been real admiration from his father for Mac's brains, his natural talents. But then James said what Mac had both expected and feared he would say.

"You reminded me so much of her, and every time I looked at you, I saw her. And then I'd get angry all over again."

 _Of course. Of course that's what he said._ "Oh, I get it, so this is my fault then," Mac snapped.

"No! No, no, no," his father tried to interrupt, like he was surprised by Mac's conclusions and the look of betrayed near devastation on the young man's face.

But Mac had held onto this for too long and nothing was going to keep it behind tight lips anymore. Even though he was pretty sure that when he opened his mouth he was going to lose it and start crying, and he didn't want to do that, not in front of this man, it still had to be said.

"You know, 'cause I lost her, too ... She was my _mom_. I was a little kid, and I needed my father, and you weren't there!"

His voice broke and he stopped, determined to pull back and keep it together. He could fall apart later if he made it out of here. When he was alone.

Instead of sympathy for his son's clearly broken heart, anger blossomed on James face and in his voice. There was pain there, too, but it seemed to come mostly from his inability to get Mac to accept his justifications.

"I'm not saying I did it right," he barked, and once again, Mac recoiled, but much less this time. "I'm just trying to tell you why I left. Why I couldn't stay."

Mac felt his control returning, although the urge to just let go of his emotions was still at a steady simmer. The thing that most backed off the internal pressure to break down wasn't even that he'd finally released a little of his anger and sadness; it was more the unanswered questions, his confusion. Mac hated not knowing things. More even than he hated heights. If his father wasn't going to say anything emotionally satisfying, he at least still wanted some answers about how he'd been set on this path to find him.

"If you wanted to stay away, then why … why the cryptic clues? Why all the mind games? The watch, the gear? The dossier under my Christmas tree ..?"

Mac stopped, his father's expression so confounded he didn't know what to make of it. James shook his head.

"I'm sorry, son, I don't know what you're talking about."

Mac had the feeling like he always got jumping out of a plane. It was like his heart was in his throat, and his stomach was in his boots. "If that wasn't you …"

Mac was about to explain what he was talking about, to ask more questions, so focused on his father's unexpected ignorance that he had nearly forgotten about the fire, about where they were. Then one of the cartel's soldiers broke through the doors, aiming a shotgun at them both and ordering them out.

"Let's go! Now!"

In a move that caught Mac completely off guard, James shoved him behind himself and advanced on the armed guard. "Nobody's going anywhere."

Mac was still stricken mute with surprise, when what he'd been hoping for when he started the fire finally happened.

Jack arrived, albeit a little unexpectedly by crashing a truck through the outer wall of the lab and leveling the cartel guard.

"The smoke, right? I mean, that was the signal?" Jack asked with his typical overly dramatic pretense at not knowing exactly what was going on.

Mac grinned at Jack, then turned toward his father, his expression repeating his earlier words with silent satisfaction. "Dalton's got it covered," that look said.

Mac hopped up into the truck bed and quickly climbed over the other side to get in.

Jack eyeballed him for a second. Okay, not bleeding was good, and the kid was moving okay, more or less, but his face said he was hurt. Jack had half an idea what that might mean, apart from the effects of the stinging smoke filling the room.

Mac looked a little like he did the day he'd thought Frankie died, or maybe more like after he'd gone to see Alfred Pena's wife and daughter. Sad, sort of resigned, and like he was going to pretend to take an hour long shower so he could let out the pain he was feeling without an audience.

But, as usual, the kid plastered on a satisfied grin that the mission was accomplished, and his eyes got a distant look, the one they always got when he'd decided he didn't want to feel anything at all.

Jack just gave his partner a nod.

"Okay, let's go. Let's go."

Once Both MacGyvers were in the truck, Mac next to him, and James in back, Jack backed out, hoping the slightly smashed truck would make it to their exfil with no more complications.


	9. Chapter 9

The pickup truck Jack had appropriated was starting to protest the hilly race through the forest to their initial exfil site. Fortunately, Matty had their short range transport back to the airport and the Phoenix jet in Mexico City, waiting in a clearing less than five miles away from the cartel stronghold.

Jack kept glancing into the bed of the truck, sort of making sure he hadn't bounced the boss out the back. Matty seemed pretty keen on both MacGyvers making it out of here alive, and since he was still kind of trying to make the breaking into her house thing up to her, he figured it was the least he could do.

Mac on the other hand, just stared straight ahead. When they first took off from the burning warehouse, Mac had asked if Jack was alright, then broken out into a coughing fit he'd clearly been trying to hold in for a while.

"I'm great, kid," Jack had answered. "How about you?" he asked, letting the probing double meaning of his question be clear, but also keeping his voice low to let Mac know there wasn't any pressure for him to answer at all.

"Peachy," Mac said with a wry smirk. Then he'd bitten back more of the caustic-smoke inspired coughing and just looked at the dirt track ahead of them.

The curt mildly sarcastic response was an acknowledgement that all was in fact not well, but damned if he was going to talk about it.

 _Fair enough_ , Jack thought, glancing in the back again, to make sure ole Sir Oversight was braced decently before he whipped around the next corner. The rest of the ride, all of another maybe ten minutes, was in silence.

Jack had sort of thought that once they were on the helicopter there might be some conversation, but James parked himself next to the pilot and got on comms with someone, presumably Matty, almost immediately, picking up the other headsets and placing them out of reach of his son and his son's partner, indicating they were not part of whatever conversation he was having, only giving a mild shrug at the look Mac gave him.

Uncharacteristically, Mac just gave a little shake of his head, and settled back into his seat, closing his eyes. Over the noise, Jack leaned in again and spoke, hopefully loud enough for Mac to hear but too quiet for anyone else. "Need anything, bud?" seemed like a safe place to start.

Mac cracked an eye open and gave Jack a small, reassuring smile. "Wouldn't hate a water, pal."

Jack nodded and reached into the cooler that had been left for them in easy reach. Jack reminded himself to thank Matty for that because as soon as he'd told her where they were, she was on getting them this exfil and as soon as he'd said 'smoke', he suspected she'd arranged extra water.

He passed the bottle to Mac who took a couple of long pulls before he grimaced and put the cap back on. Jack raised a quizzical eyebrow. "Everything smells like burning chemicals and smoke," Mac said. "Tastes like it, too."

Jack nodded, getting himself a water instead of saying much else. He knew what Mac meant. After that fire in Somalia a couple years ago, Jack would have sworn he could smell the building burning for at least a month. But it wasn't like Mac to complain, about much of anything really. Jack was going to say something to that effect, but Mac had already closed his eyes again.

He was pretending to sleep, but Jack could see him clenching and unclenching his jaw.

He was surprised it was a ruse Mac would even try to pull. Mac occasionally slept on the luxurious Phoenix jet, rarely slept on the tactical aircraft, and as long as Jack had known him Mac had never slept on a helicopter unless he was injured and full of the good drugs. And only barely then.

So he definitely was avoiding talking. Since Mac had to know Jack wasn't buying it, this had to be about avoiding James. Whatever had gone down between the two Macs hadn't been great, or whatever they'd been through on the compound had been bad.

Given James casual posture in the seat up front, Jack figured it was the former. Since a real conversation here would require headsets or more volume than privacy could tolerate, Jack just stayed quiet, too. He could wait Mac out. He'd done it before.

When they got to the jet, they discovered that either Oversight had brought them here with a full crew and had ordered the support staff to stay out of the main cabin on their way in, or Matty had sped up getting them the extras she usually liked to send along for when the inevitable problems arose.

That there were several stewards and two medics caused Mac and Jack to exchange a look. Medics, sure. Especially after this slipshod planless fiasco. Neither was surprised by that. But stewards to do things like bring food and tend bar was unheard of on an exfil flight. Clearly Oversight liked to drag his staff along, Mac grumbled to Jack, who just shot him a look, wondering what had happened on this mission.

Mac had still been surprised by Oversight's identity, angry even, when Jack had left them to go take care of the lookouts, but he'd been trying. And Jack had thought Oversight was starting to open up.

The way James was practically ignoring his son, and Mac was going back and forth between closed off and sort of resentfully hurt and angry broadcast even further estrangement … But Mac was also casting glances at his dad that had something else there, too. A hopefulness Jack hadn't seen before. So for as much as he was sure something not great had gone down, he thought maybe some good had come of it too.

As his father started up the steps, Mac looked at Jack for a second and said, "See you in a few." Jack nodded and patted him on the shoulder. Mac jogged toward the jet then turned. "Hey, if those stewards happened to bring along a beer or ten ..?"

Jack grinned. "I'll snag you one, kid."

Jack watched Mac stop his father at the door and say something. His father nodded, then gestured vaguely toward the inside of the jet. Mac frowned and shook his head. James spoke again, and when Mac answered Jack had caught up enough to hear it.

"Dad, I'm fine. I just want to make sure we get to talk before we get back to Phoenix and the debrief gets in the way."

James looked at Mac, sort of down his nose, his eyes cool and speculative now. "I'm sure since you're _fine_ the medic will hardly take up any of your time."

He started inside and Mac said, sort of irritated, but almost pleading for another real human moment, "What about you? You're twice my age, you breathed in at least as much of that crap as I did, and you've been hacking up a lung since Jack showed up. If anyone needs a medic it's …"

As seemed to be his habit, James interrupted his son again, "It's the young man who managed to thwart a bank robbery while he was supposed to be on vacation and got himself more than a little beat up in the process, was subjected to similar rough treatment in Pakistan not two days later and failed to report it," Mac's eyes widened, but his mouth snapped shut. "And who earlier today dove through a plate glass window, tackled and fought with a piece of armed cartel muscle, and nearly got himself sliced apart."

Mac started to say something. "Dad, I …"

"And that was before getting knocked around by Walsh's men and breathing in the fumes and smoke from that very clever fire he set that got us the help we needed to get to exfil. If anyone needs a medic, it's that young man. I wasn't asking, son," he finished, one eyebrow cocked in what looked like impatient annoyance. Then his face softened a fraction. "I need to make a phone call. Let the medic have a look at you and as soon as I'm done with some administrative things, we'll talk."

James went inside.

As Mac moved to follow, Jack saw a familiar stubborn line form across Mac's forehead. Nothing would suffice until he had the answers that were now so nearly in his grasp. Besides, Jack suspected that anything that felt even mildly out of Mac's control was going to be unacceptable to him at the moment.

When Jack caught up with them, James was already sitting at the executive desk unique to this jet at Phoenix as the crew started to prepare for takeoff, and both the medics were sort of hovering in the background, looking at their boss almost apprehensively. Mac was standing in front of his father, arms folded. "I don't need a medic, Dad. I still need answers."

James looked up from the tablet he was perusing, clearly having picked it up almost immediately upon boarding. "Angus, I've already told you what I need from you. You want to talk? You see the medic like I said. Honestly, son, you're much too old to argue about a little basic medical care, don't you think?"

Mac looked like he had something to say about both his father's words and the patronizing tone he used but the cell in his father's hand rang and, without another glance at Mac, his eyes returned to the tablet and he answered the call.

"Director Webber … Yes, I got the report you sent … No, they seem fine. Although that has yet to be verified … Dalton wasn't involved in any direct action to the best of my knowledge, and of course, Angus is being stubborn as usual."

Both medics, a man and a woman, wearing easily recognizable Phoenix Foundation uniforms, looked at him at the same time, with nearly identical expressions.

"I'm _fine_ ," he stated with involuntary annoyed emphasis.

The woman, whose name patch was too faded to make out, began with, "Sir, if you want to just …"

"I _want_ to not repeat myself, but I will ... I'm fine." There was inarguable finality in his tone.

She looked at Oversight helplessly. He gave her a mild roll of his eyes and a shrug that said he could not hold her responsible for someone else's behavior. Somehow Mac read that he considered the behavior childish or at least inappropriate to the situation. Mac decided that he didn't care if it was true right now or not.

Mac huffed a frustrated sigh and stalked over to one of the sofas, where he flopped down across from Jack, who had wisely retreated out of the blast radius of Mac's temper when he saw how the conversation was going. BY which he meant Oversight had closed himself off and was holding those answers Mac sought hostage to gain Mac's cooperation. _That's a mistake,_ Jack thought.

As the jet started to take off, Jack apologetically handed Mac the only beverage that was available, another bottled water. After seeing that exchange he was unsurprised about Mac's half joking request for a beer. The tension was palpable, to say the least.

"Sorry, bud. I guess Oversight only allows water on his flights."

Mac shrugged, deliberately not looking in his father's direction now. He coughed into the crook of his elbow then just uncapped the water and took a drink. "Thanks, Jack," Mac said quietly. His nose wrinkled again like it had on the helicopter.

"Still taste like ass?" Jack asked.

"Tastes like _ash_ anyway."

Mac forced a small chuckle, then regretted it as it set him coughing again. When he stopped he smirked at Jack, whose face wore the expected concern, but who Mac thought was doing an admirable job keeping a lid on it.

They sat in silence for what seemed like a long while, miles slipping away below them, Mac slowly sipping his water even though it still tasted like the fire, and Jack texting back and forth with Bozer.

Boze knew more of the back story with Mac's dad, knew more than him about what their relationship had been like. Jack had known they were estranged, known Mac was largely raised by his grandfather, even known he'd lived with the Bozers for a long time, but he'd never dug too deep in the details.

He just didn't think Mac would appreciate that. But there were things he needed to know, he thought, if he wasn't going to make this situation worse.

Mac knew Jack was texting someone. And it had to be about him because Jack kept stealing concerned little peeks his way. So he was guessing it was Bozer. Boze had texted him simply, "Okay?" a while ago and he'd sent a thumbs up, which for them was kind of a code; it meant more or less 'yeah, but give me some space'. God knew both of them were probably deep into brother mode by now.

Mac appreciated Jack not going overboard on his helicopter parent routine at the moment. He didn't think he could take anyone acting like an actual parent at the moment when the person who should was just being a condescending closed off jerk.

Except when he'd put himself between Mac and that cartel guy right before Jack got there, his brain helpfully reminded him. He also caught the man staring at him with what appeared to be genuine worry a few times and speaking quietly to the medic sitting closest to him in his little office area.

This was all so goddamned confusing.

He sighed again, this time stifling the cough that resulted from the disconcerting feeling that he was breathing through rancid cotton candy.

Jack's eyebrow climbed. _Oh, here we go_ , Mac thought. And sure enough, as the jet leveled off at their cruising altitude, Jack finally said, "You know, Mac, letting one of those guys have a look at you wouldn't be your worst idea ever."

Mac rolled his eyes, then looked toward the back where the two medics sat, neither of whom were familiar to them. "They look pretty comfortable right where they are, Jack."

Jack looked like he'd respond and Mac definitely couldn't take Jack saying anything remotely like his dad had so he just went on, "And I'm very comfortable with them there, too."

"Alright, man." Jack held up his hands in good natured defeat, but tipped his chin in that general direction. "I don't think your old man likes 'em where they are though."

The male medic finished saying something to Oversight then headed over to where Mac was sitting.

Mac's lips pressed together in a thin line.

"Hey, there," the medic said, friendly but not pushy.

The guy was about Jack's age and had the same sort of good natured lilt to his words, but Mac marked his accent as Okie rather than Texan. Mac wondered if he'd been selected for this mission for that reason, that someone assumed some vague resemblance to Jack might make Mac more agreeable.

He wouldn't put much past his father after all the … then he remembered, his father claimed ignorance of the clues, of the codes, of Mac's hunt for him beyond the letter that had traveled fruitlessly around the world. Mac frowned, his head starting to ache vaguely from trying to sort out the facts, his feelings, the ongoing mystery of it all. The medic stood a reasonable distance away.

"Agent MacGyver … Oversight wants me to …"

Mac shook his head, slapping his hands on his thighs and standing up. "Look," Mac squinted the the wrinkled patch on the man's jacket. "Ross … Oversight wants a lot of things."

The green eyes looking back at him widened slightly at this insubordinate display. Mac was slightly reassured that the man didn't seem to know about the relationship between him and the boss.

He tipped the man a wry grin. "But what I want is to shower the smoke smell off myself before any of that. Okay?"

His smile and the slight tilt of this head said 'C'mon man, the boss is just being the boss; let's us reasonable people act that way'. Despite the hard stare that boss was giving both of them, Ross nodded. This agent wasn't bleeding, was moving pretty well (he was guessing maybe some bruised ribs from the slight guarding going on that he was pretty sure the young man wasn't even aware of), and other than some very minor smoke inhalation, he seemed fine. "Sure, man, I'm not going anywhere."

Mac flashed a grateful grin.

"Be back in a few."

Then he disappeared down the small hallway that led to this jet's fully stocked bathroom that was off a small private bunk room.

The medic, Ross, just situated himself on the sofa Mac recently vacated and got out a tablet, immediately engrossed in some sort of paperwork if his thoughtful expression was any indication. Jack went back to his phone, a game this time rather than more texting. Riley was busy and Bozer had been called in to meet with Matty.

After a while, Jack sensed someone enter his space. Not Mac. He looked up to see an almost pensive looking Oversight standing next to the other couch. The medic had gone back to his original seat at some point that Jack hadn't noticed.

"Sir," Jack acknowledged with a nod.

"We'll be beginning approach procedures very shortly."

A Jack had noted the change in the flight path some time ago. "Yessir, I noticed," Jack agreed.

"Angus hasn't come back from showering or whatever he's doing back there yet. He's been gone for over an hour."

"Yessir, I noticed that, too," Jack answered, not saying that very little about Mac ever escaped his attention. And not sure of what to make of James's expression or tone.

There was detachment, some irritation, but also, Jack was almost certain, a carefully concealed interest and concern.

"You know him better than I do, Dalton. Is he alright, or should I send someone back to check on him? Since he seems determined to avoid …" he trailed off for a moment, then concluded, "being reasonable."

Jack shrugged. "I think he's fine, sir."

"He's had a physically rough couple weeks, say nothing about the last day or so, and should almost definitely be evaluated." James observed. "And you know as well as I, probably more so, that he doesn't report …"

"Anything he thinks is less than critical, sir. But if it's critical he says so. You can count on it. I think …"

Jack hesitated and James cocked an eyebrow at him. "I think I probably need to make it an order."

Jack tried again. " _I think_ digging in and pushing him about much of anything at the moment might be a mistake, sir."

James expression became somewhat haughty. "I'm his boss, Dalton."

"I don't know that that's the role he needs to be reminded about at the moment, sir. No disrespect, you understand. Just like you said, I know him a little." Jack shrugged again. The man could take his advice or not. He was Jack's boss, and Jack didn't need to be reminded of it either, so for now at least, he wasn't going to argue.

But he was starting to see a little of why Mac seemed so conflicted. For starters, even Jack was a little freaked out by James having manipulated their lives, their careers, even if he was happy to know Mac and be a part of his life. Besides, it seemed James didn't know how to be a good boss or a good dad. He was clearly smart enough to figure it out, if he didn't ruin it by pushing Mac away. Jack couldn't imagine that he would with all the trouble he'd gone to to lead Mac to him.

James puffed out a long frustrated breath and ran a hand through his hair in a gesture that almost made Jack laugh it was so familiar. "He's always been like this," James grumbled. "Stubborn, unreasonable, certain he can use logic to avoid dealing with any situation he finds unpleasant …"

This time Jack did crack a smile. "Gee, I wonder where he gets that from, sir," he said in a tone that said he didn't wonder at all. Then he decided to maybe go a little further. "I'm here to tell ya making getting checked out by the medic, or much of anything an order rather than a request that comes from the fact that you care about him, making it about either of your roles at Phoenix at all probably ain't your best move. I think he's he a harder time with you being Oversight than he is about the fact that you left." Somehow, maybe because he'd had some time to sit with it, he was able to keep the recrimination out of his voice.

James nodded, thoughtful. "Thank you, Dalton, I'll take that under advisement."

He returned to his seat.

The pilot announced their final approach, a reminder to the passengers and crew to be seated and follow safety protocols. When Mac didn't immediately emerge to take a seat (and get seatbelted) Jack wondered if Oversight's Impulse to check on the kid had been a wise one.

Then Mac came back, hair wet, and looking at least a little pleased with himself for some reason. He looked around and seeing his father practically hiding behind his tablet, Ross on his phone, the other medic napping, and the stewards gone back to the crew area, his shoulders immediately lowered like a great deal of tension evaporated immediately.

He sat down, this time next to Jack. "Hey," he said.

"Hey, bud. Kind of a long shower, don't ya think?" he asked, leaving it up to Mac whether he chose to interpret it as just a yes or no question.

Mac smiled a little. "I took a really quick shower actually. Hopped in when I heard the captain say we were almost home."

"Hmmm," Jack said, looking directly at Mac and wondering if his gaze would be met. It was. "You we're gone an awfully long time," he observed, again leaving how he responded up to Mac.

Mac sighed and shook his head a little. "I was thinking."

"About what, bud?" Jack prodded gently.

"Stuff my dad said," Mac replied, not quite able to lay it all out for Jack right now. He'd need some time before any of that went anywhere but on the continuous loop it was playing on in his head, since he didn't like to share things until they made sense.

The fact that his father denied sending him those clues, denied trying to reconnect with him … it made him feel even more unsettled. Would his father have been happy to continue to manipulate his life from behind the scenes? Who had led him here?

He looked at Jack, still wondering if there was any way his partner was involved. He knew if Jack had known he would have wanted Mac to know too, but if an order prevented him from telling he … no, that wasn't true; Jack had broken into Matty's to help him.

Finally he decided he needed to just say it out loud, directly to Jack. "You really didn't know anything about this, right?"

Jack swallowed hard at the naked need in his friend's voice. He made sure Mac was still looking directly at him so he could both see and hear his sincerity. "I really didn't know." Feeling the need to bring a little levity to the moment, he added, "Damn, son, you really think I'd a gone chasin all those clues he sent ya if I'd known how to give ya the answer?"

Mac almost told him then, getting as far as opening his mouth, but he stopped at the last second. "I guess not, pal." He looked at Jack for a minute and Jack saw the flicker of the muscles in his jaw bunching as Mac gritted his teeth for a second. "I'm sorry, Jack, I …"

"No apologies necessary, kid. Not over this. Okay."

Mac closed his eyes briefly and nodded.

They spent the last few minutes until they landed in silence, Jack watching Mac and trying to decide if he should say anything else, offer an observation that his dad seemed legitimately worried about him, but ultimately decided that was too pushy, that one half assed parent nagging you at a time was enough.

Mac just stared out the window, thinking. Thinking about how his father had manipulated his life, about how he'd brushed off the question about why he'd drawn Mac I to the life, about his revelation about his anger that felt more like blame. Even about who might have sent the clues that led him here. But mostly he was thinking about family.

And the fact that the one he already had was better than the one that had chosen to leave him, regardless of anything the man said or questioned.


	10. Chapter 10

When they disembarked, Oversight made another comment about Mac having not availed himself of the medic's services. Mac didn't necessarily think he shouldn't, just he'd be damned if he was going to take an order about it at the moment, and that's what it felt like.

This wasn't a concerned family member making a suggestion. The tone said the boss told you to do a thing and you are being insubordinate and I ought to write you up for it. Come to think of it, that was kind of how he'd treated him as a kid, too. That was even worse.

Mac just smirked slightly and said, "You always were an observant guy, Dad," before heading off to claim his Jeep and take it home to his garage for repair work. "Pick me up for the debrief?" he called out to Jack who was pleased to find Matty had his car dropped off here too for when they returned.

"Agent Dalton has details I need to be filled in on. I'll send a car for you," Oversight said tersely before Jack could respond.

Mac frowned, "Alright, I guess."

Then he drove off, listening for any strange rattles and attentive for any odd smells or strange lights. He didn't think the Jeep had been hit anywhere important but focusing on that was easier than thinking.

He parked, covered the back of his Jeep with a roofing tarp, and looked around.

It was good to be home.

He coughed a little and grumbled to himself. He'd probably be tasting that nasty crap for days, say nothing about coughing and blowing his nose every ten minutes in an effort to get rid of it, if his past experiences with burning buildings were any indication.

Since he had to wait around for a ride, unless he wanted to take his motorcycle to work, which he kind of didn't, remembering how his father had disapproved of even his bicycle when he was a kid, he decided to go try to shower off more of the fire smell and change clothes to see if that helped with the coughing. He really didn't want to show up to work for the debrief still doing it.

Freshly showered (again) and dressed in clean clothes, Mac determined that he felt loads better. Then he coughed again. He was outside looking at the Jeep again and grumbling to himself a little bit about it when one of the Phoenix cars pulled in.

"Hey Evan," he greeted the driver, climbing into the passenger side instead of the back just like he always did.

Evan grinned at him. "Hey, Mac. Rough mission?" he tipped his chin at the Jeep Mac had just finished pulling a blue vinyl tarp back over as Evan had pulled up. "More than some," Mac answered with a wry smile as they pulled out of Mac's driveway and back onto the road.

"You've had kind of a rough stretch here lately," Evan observed. He'd been the driver that had gotten him back to Phoenix after he ate pavement the day Murdoc had kidnapped him. Mac didn't remember much of that ride, but he very nearly blushed at the memory of being half passed out practically on Jack's lap.

"It sure has. But at least today didn't end with Jack having to practically carry me home like last time you had to pick me up," he laughed lightly to cover his slight discomfort.

"Yeah, well, I think you probably should have let him that day, man." He paused. "Jack okay?" he asked, letting his surprise that he wasn't picking up both of them or that Jack hadn't been Mac's ride if the Jeep had gotten damaged show plainly.

"Yeah, definitely," Mac replied, taking out his phone to see if there were already a million texts asking where he was. There wasn't. Just one. ' _Debriefing with Sir Oversight. Find you when I'm through_.'

Mac smiled at first, then frowned. They rarely if ever participated in a formal debrief separately from a joint mission. Of course, nothing about this mission was exactly standard, Mac thought, starting to brood about it a little.

Evan waited a few minutes, but the expression didn't fade.

And Mac didn't say anything else.

"You okay, Mac?" he asked tentatively.

Mac nodded. "Yeah, sure. Why?" Then he cleared his throat and it started him coughing again and it went on for a full minute until his face was red and he was swearing under his breath. "Okay, not awesome," he admitted in response to the driver's expression. Then he explained, "Chemical fire."

Evan just nodded. Then he made a face, like he didn't want to say what was about to come out of his mouth but was going to do it anyway. "So when we get back, do you think …"

Mac raised on eyebrow. "Tell me I should go to Medical. Go ahead. I double dog dare you."

Evan laughed. "So you _don't_ think that's a good suggestion?"

Mac couldn't help laugh a little at the way the guy said it. "Probably, but … who told you to say so?"

Mac did an admirable job hiding the real suspicion that Oversight was somehow constantly engaged in getting him to do what he wanted, but the feeling was there, intense, and making him question every little direction he'd gone in since he was seven years old.

"Nobody, man. Just … smoke is bad news and probably a little oxygen would knock that cough out for you. No reason to suffer through a long debrief trying to hack up a lung."

Mac studied the driver for a minute. That was just genuine concern and helpfulness, something he realized characterized just about everyone at Phoenix. Mac smiled a little to himself, thinking regardless of his father's motives or manipulative behavior, he'd created something pretty great. Mac decided he was going to talk to his dad before he made any choices about what to do next.

Quitting had felt right when he thought Matty was up to no good, but now … now he just wanted his family back to normal. Maybe he could figure the new stuff out like Jack seemed to think.

When they got back to the office, Mac decided to do the smart thing and just stop in to the infirmary. He lurked around the desk for a few minutes until he ascertained who was working.

When he saw that it was Dr. Patel, he saw no good reason not to admit why he was there. She laughed and said the boss had called down and suggested she go hunt him down, but after the things she'd seen him simply walk off, especially in the last year that seemed a little silly.

"I didn't expect to see you, to be honest," she added.

His lips twisted into a wry smile. "I'd hate to think I was getting predictable."

Then he asked if Jack had called too. She smiled and shook her head. Agent Dalton had stopped by in person, asked for a print out of symptoms of smoke inhalation, and made sure he knew who was on duty every shift for the next three days. Mac smiled and shook his head. That sounded like Jack alright.

While he was waiting around, putting up with more general fussing than he'd intended when he made the decision to stop in, he had a fair amount of time to think. He started to feel like some of the puzzle pieces were at least getting closer together in his mind.

He was on his way out when something occurred to him. He wondered just how worried about him his father had actually been. "Dr. Patel, is it common for Oversight to call down here about agents?"

She frowned, a little confused. "I've never spoken to Oversight, Mac."

Now Mac was frowning, too. "Earlier, you said 'the boss' and …"

Her eyes brightened with realization. "I meant Director Webber. I'm sorry I forgot hearing Oversight was involved in your mission. That must have been a bit intimidating I imagine?" Her expression was frankly curious. Oversight was a mystery to everyone here at Phoenix.

"You have no idea," Mac replied with a slight eye roll. Then he processed the rest of what she had said. "Director Webber called down here about me?"

Dr. Patel laughed lightly. "Mac, she checks up on you more than your partner. Not just today either."

Suddenly it all made sense.

0-0-0

Mac stopped and took a deep breath outside the door to Matty's office. He'd been so angry when he'd spoken to her the other morning. He wondered what her reaction to him would be now. Regardless, there were things he needed to say. Even if she didn't answer him.

He was about to open the door when his phone chimed an unknown number text alert. He took it out and looked. ' _Glad you decided to be sensible. I'm free to talk now_.'

Mac frowned at the phone for a moment, wondering if the offer came only because he'd complied with his father's wishes and seen the doctor, or if he was genuinely reaching out just because he knew Mac was in the building. He shrugged to himself, moving to slip the phone into his jacket and remembering he'd left it at home, settling on his pants pocket instead.

He felt a little naked without his jacket but he'd have to see what the dry cleaner could do with it before he wore it again. Damn thing reeked and the smoke smell was still permeating his every breath. Dr. P said that might take a little while to get rid of, and he neither wanted to subject anyone else to the smell from his jacket, or make just breathing any worse than it was.

Feeling he'd delayed the moment long enough, he tapped lightly on the door and opened it. "Hey, Matty," he greeted softly.

Matty turned and Mac felt an instant sort of relief.

She didn't look hurt or angry because of how he'd spoken to her before. She looked happy to see him, relieved that he was here. She smiled. It was an altogether affectionate, very nearly, motherly expression. It made his eyes burn, and he very nearly lost his nerve. "Glad you made it back, Mac," she offered with genuine warmth. He opened his mouth to talk and realized if he did so at that moment his voice was going to crack. And not from the minor damage he'd sustained in the fire.

She seemed to sense something, because she gave him a minute by filling him in on the intel that she'd gathered since Phoenix had located them in Mexico. He walked across the room toward her, fixing his face in an expression that would have conveyed to anyone who knew him a little less well that he was totally interested in talking about the mission.

However, as good as Matty was at subterfuge, she didn't manage to look as surprised as she might have hoped when Mac sat down on the coffee table and face her.

"Thank you, Matty."

 _Damn it all to hell anyway_ , he sounded as much like he might cry as he felt.

Then she made him smile just a little with feigned surprise. "For what?" she asked, blinking with saccharin innocence, completely unbelievably, which Mac knew was as much for his benefit as anything he was here to thank her for.

He felt his eyes starting to water and decided it didn't matter. He was going to get this out anyway. "The watch. The dossier … All the bread crumbs. I know it was you."

It sort of made him feel a little better when Matty swallowed hard and blinked slowly. Not because he'd figured it out, or not because she was upset or worried anyway. But because this was emotional for her too. He didn't know why, and he supposed it didn't matter. He just needed to acknowledge it. "You took an enormous personal risk …"

When she spoke again, pretty clearly near tears herself, "Mac I can neither confirm, nor deny …" he just followed his first impulse. Trusted his gut, so to speak, thinking briefly that Jack had either been a very good or a very bad influence. He just wrapped Matty in a spontaneous hug, and somewhat to his surprise (say nothing about her own), she just hugged him back. Neither acknowledged whether they might have felt the others momentary tears slip onto their shoulders, but later they would reflect that the moment still changed a lot of things.

For both of them.

0-0-0

A little while later, after downing about three bottles of water, splashing his face repeatedly to get rid of the evidence of his emotional conversation with Matty, and vaguely considering going back downstairs to take the doctor up on her offer of the magical beads of cough suppressant that didn't zonk him out, Mac finally made his way up to the next level of offices where Oversight was apparently waiting to speak to him.

When he hadn't responded to the earlier text, apparently it was taken a little personally because the next message came through Matty. She looked at her phone and said, "You're being summoned, Mac."

Mac had smiled and shaken his head. "I'm on my way." He's paused. "Thank you," he repeated.

It felt important that she know how grateful he was. He wasn't sure why. His brain was tied in too many knots to be sure of much of anything, but going with his feelings today was starting to feel pretty good.

She must have let Jack know he was coming because his partner met him as he got off the elevator. "You good, bud?" he asked carefully.

If anyone could tell he was a little bit of a mess, it was Jack of course. But he just offered a small smile letting him know that maybe he wasn't, but it would keep until later. He thought maybe after they got out of here he might be ready to let Jack know about Matty, and about some of the things his father had said. But crying at work once in a … ever … was too much for him, so he was way over his limit for today. And he realized he probably wasn't done. This was just … a lot. "I'm gettin' there, pal."

Jack pushed the door open and held it. Mac needed to talk, Jack could tell, could feel his tension. And Mac wasn't exactly letting him know what he needed so Jack decided to test the waters. "Well, we finally found your long lost father." The immediate click of a dry-mouthed swallow and the flexing of Mac's jaw said now was not the time for anything serious. "You got any other relatives you wanna go lookin' for real quick?"

Mac cracked a smile, but then sighed quietly. He suddenly wanted to very explicitly tell Jack how he felt too. He didn't want to turn into a man that would leave people who loved him wondering. If he got nothing else out of finding James MacGyver, it would be that. That he didn't want to be like him. "Honestly, I feel a little stupid spending all this time looking for my absentee father when the only family I really need has been right in front of my face all along."

Jack glanced at him. Rarely did Mac ever say anything so openly demonstrative. "Ah, well the feelin's mutual there, brother," he said, trying to keep his tone light.

Mac's whole being spoke of tension right now, and Jack really didn't want to pile on. But he also, didn't want Mac to close himself off to his dad just because he was still hurt and angry. Jack truly believed he'd regret that later.

Besides, he'd spent several hours with James, and while he thought the man was oddly determined to hide it, he detected a real interest in Mac, and a strangely fierce desire to protect him and see him realize his potential. Jack thought how the man was going about it was sure as Hell misguided, but then again, he didn't really know him. And he didn't need to. But Mac probably did. And he sure had spent a lot of time trying to get the change to.

He hurried to add, "But, you know, that's the great thing about family is it's never too late to add one more."

Mac bit his lip, having the distressing thought that sometimes it is too late. He really hoped it wasn't, but the four texts he'd received since Oversight had called down to Matty's office looking for him that more or less amounted to ' _I'm waiting_ ' had Mac very on edge, even if he was being asked to come have the talk he'd been asking for for the better part of the last two days.

Jack misread his tension though. Meaning to be reassuring, Jack half joked like the notion was ridiculous, "Hey, hey, this, uh, well, this whole dust-up between your old man and Walsh Something like that could never happen to us, could it?"

"C'mon," Mac said derisively, suddenly wondering in a very specific way what his father might have said to Jack while he was gone. "Besides, if you went to the dark side, I'd just figure a way to bring you back."

As he'd hoped, Jack's face lost a little of the concern with the dropping of a Star Wars reference, and when it devolved into Jack making wookie noises, Mac figured he'd lived up to his end of the partner bargain and gotten Jack back out of his own head after whatever Oversight might have planted there.

Jack figured he probably ought to get out of there and give Mac some space. The kid would probably be tied up for a while anyway, and if past experience told Jack anything, it was that Mac was going to want some space after this talk was over. You just couldn't push the kid at times like this. If you did, the walls would go up so fast, they'd be crushing you before you realized they'd been built right on top of where you were standing.

But when Jack saw how tentative Matty looked, just standing their eyeballing the open door, he stopped where he was. What could have Matty looking so concerned now that everyone was home safe and Oversight had finally agreed to talking with Mac?

Mac walked into the office, feeling a little apprehensive after some of things his father had already told him about the past, but also a little relieved that the man wasn't just avoiding him. "You wanted to see me?" he asked, not pointing out that calling Matty and texting him repeatedly was mabe a little overkill to get that done.

James nodded. "Yesterday, you came to me asking to quit Phoenix …" His eyes bored into Mac's. "So, do you want to work with me or not?"

 _Seriously_ , Mac wanted to yell. _Father/son chat? After everything you unloaded on me, telling me it was basically my own fault for growing up without a father, and don't you dare try to dress that up, that's what you said, after all of that this is just about whether or not I'm going to let you keep trying to get me killed?_

Nothing like that came out of his mouth though. He felt like he was going to cry. Or shout. Or do something else he would hate himself for later.

He took a deep breath.

His grandfather had always said, whenever you're overwhelmed, feel like you don't know what to do, just calm down and take a breath; the solution to whatever your problem is will present itself.

He knew what he had to do.

"I'm really glad I found you, and that we were able to talk about things that haven't made sense to me over the years." And as for me working here, I'll tell you the same thing I told Matty … I can't work with someone I don't trust." His father blinked like he was confused. Mac swallowed hard. This was the hardest thing he'd ever done. And a grown man anyway. Getting up and going to school the day after his father had left, that was probably the other thing that came close. "I'm sorry, Dad, but I can't work for you."

James MacGyver blinked in surprise, mouth hanging open. All of his carefully laid plans seemed to fly out of it, like flies. "You're quitting?" he said with almost horrified disbelief.

Mac's jaw firmed fractionally, his shoulders squared slightly. This was the right thing. He gave an almost imperceptible nod. "Effective immediately."

Mac turned on his heel and left, breezing passed his stunned family, his real family. He'd explain his reasons to them later. For now he just needed to get out of here. Before Oversight figured out some new and interesting way to make his little work project jump through the expect hoops. When that thought crossed his mind some of his original anger returned and his pace quickened.

The rest of the team stood in stunned silence. Jack, especially, seemed at a loss. After Mac had disappeared out the doors, they remained staring after him for several minutes in stunned silence. After another passed by, Matty finally spoke. "What are you waiting for, Jack? If our boy ever needed somebody to watch his back, it's now."

Jack nodded, not even turning to see what Mac's father was making of the situation.

"Yes, ma'am," he replied, and started toward the door.


	11. Chapter 11

Jack remembered just as the elevator chimed before the doors opened on the parking garage that Mac hadn't come to Phoenix in his Jeep. He checked his phone, hoping perhaps that there was a text from his partner, but there was nothing.

He proceeded to where he'd parked his car, half expecting to find Mac leaning against the hood, arms folded, upset that his dramatic exit had been thwarted by the lack of a means to flee. Jack was once again disappointed.

Where the Hell had the kid gotten to?

Jack had a feeling Mac had been on the edge of breaking down, or at least losing his cool, because when he'd turned on his heel and left Oversight's office, he hadn't looked left or right, had almost determinedly avoided looking at Jack or anyone else.

Jack got into his car and started it, then realized if Mac wasn't here, and hadn't texted him he had no idea what to do or where to go. Had the kid just taken off for home on foot? That was … Jack did some mental math (the kind he was good at since it involved just calling up a map of the city he had in his head - he'd always been good with maps) … twelve miles. Jack sighed.

Mac had gone to Medical with no one prompting him, had still been coughing periodically like he was going to try to yack up a lung, and Jack knew he was a little busted up too, if only because when he'd ridden back in to Phoenix with Oversight, it had been mentioned that the medic suspected injured ribs. But he wouldn't put it past the kid to decide to just hoof it home after that, even in the bruising late spring heat of the city.

Jack took out his phone and tried Mac's number, thinking if the kid wasn't going to call him, he'd just make it clear, job at Phoenix or no job at Phoenix, he still had Mac's back.

A bland female voice answered. "Hello?"

"Who's this?" Jack asked, feeling a brief moment of panic, not unlike he'd felt when he'd walked into Mac's last fall and realized Murdoc had taken him.

Someone else answering Mac's phone was not okay. Not even at all.

"Agent Dalton," the woman said, without pausing, so he knew she was sure of his identity. "This is Amber in the Phoenix Administrative Office. Mr. MacGyver left his phone at the front desk on his way out of the building several minutes ago. If you happened to call this number, Oversight has requested you return to his office to speak about this matter."

Jack swore under his breath. "You let Mr. Oversight know, he's gonna have to wait a little bit to talk …"

"Agent Dalton, he requested that you return _immediately_ , sir, and …"

"Like I said, honey, he's just gonna have to wait." Jack hung up and immediately called Matty.

"Jack, Oversight …"

"Can kiss my ass at the moment, Matilda. Mac's gone. His phone's here. And I have no idea how in the hell he left with his car at home or which way he mighta gone. Help or hang up." Jack's voice left no room for argument.

He heard Matty cover the mouthpiece and say something.

He waited.

He was about ready to just toss his phone onto the seat and take off, hoping that maybe Mac had headed home on the usual driving route if he'd gone on foot, when she came back, her voice quiet. "Jack … Oversight is …"

"Pissed?" Jack asked, without any sympathy whatsoever.

He was pretty pissed himself, and he couldn't decide if it was at Mac for just walking out the way he had, Oversight for whatever happened that might have caused that, or himself for allowing something like a supervisor throwing his weight around to separate him from his partner when Mac had so clearly needed him.

"Upset," Matty said, her voice tight. "I'm running interference, but he said as far as he's concerned Mac no longer works here so you …"

"I'm taking a personal day or two. I just hurt like hell from crashing that truck into that building to bail his sorry ass outta there. You tell him I'm gonna go home and recover. I've got the sick time. I'm usin' it. He can't even write me up for that without looking like the asshole," he said, making it very clear that it was absolutely just a story he was making up on the fly and he was going to need her to sell it for him.

Or Oversight could fire him.

At the moment he didn't really give a good goddamn.

"That's actually pretty clever, Jack," she said with subdued admiration.

"Tell me you've got something for me, Matty. I'll take anything."

Jack could have sworn he could hear Riley in the background during the brief pause. Then Matty was back. "Camera has him heading away from the building, on foot, going north east. Riley says she's not accessing the cameras outside Phoenix on her work laptop. If Mac doesn't want Phoenix to track him, which she thinks he must not if he left his phone, she doesn't want to be part of it."

Jack was about to get annoyed, but he actually respected that. "Tell her I said thanks for giving me a place to start."

He was about to end the call and head out in a northeasterly direction, but Matty's voice stopped him.

"When you find him Jack ... let me know he's okay? Just … I don't think he'll mind. It's not like we don't know where he lives," she added.

"Will do, Matty." Jack nodded, frowning as he pulled out of the parking garage. _"What good would ditching that phone be if he was just going home?"_ Jack mumbled to himself.

He had a terrible feeling suddenly that Mac was going to drop off the grid, just disappear out of his life. Jack didn't know anyone who'd been in the business for very long who was even halfway decent at it that didn't have at least one identity they'd developed that they could use in an emergency, like getting burn noticed (disavowed, if you wanted to be formal about it).

And Mac was very, very good.

Jack had scoffed when Mac said he could find Jack in a day, but Jack figured he was probably not far off the mark. Not because Jack wasn't good, but because Mac was just that incredible, that much better, smarter, than anyone else Jack had ever known. He was afraid if Mac didn't want to be found, he wouldn't be able to find him. The guy had a secret escape hatch in his own house for Christ's sake.

Would Mac do something like that? Jack hoped not, hoped the bond they had meant more than that, and he was sure, deep down that it did, but what happened between Mac and his father that made him quit was still a mystery.

He drove around for what felt like an eternity. His eyes scanned the sidewalks, overpasses, bike paths, anywhere he thought Mac might be walking along. And every time he saw a glint of blond hair (of which there was an abundance in this part of town) he got hopeful for a second, only to be disappointed a second later.

He tried calling Mac's house phone, calling Bozer, even calling a couple of mutual friends that he thought there was the barest possibility Mac might have called if he believed everyone at Phoenix was off limits.

He'd just about made up his mind to head to Mac's place and see if he was either there or if he could figure out where he might have gone from things that were lying around when his phone rang. He glanced at it on his seat. It was an unknown number. Probably Oversight. He thought briefly about ignoring it.

Then he decided, screw it, if it was Oversight and he wanted to give him an ass-chewing for leaving, he'd just chew right back with the mood he was in right now. He was pretty sure he had at least thirty new grey hairs since Mac and walked out the double doors of the executive wing about an hour and a half before.

"Dalton," he said after hitting the green button.

"Jack, man, I was starting to think I was gonna be stuck with voicemail."

"Mac! Where the hell are you?"

"Um … at the Apple store. Just got my new phone set up. Are you still at work?"

"No, I'm lookin' for you, ya big dumb genius."

"Of course you are. Wanna come pick me up? I'd rather ride with you than get an Uber even if you do drive like a maniac in that new car." There was an almost a natural sounding chuckle, but it was still a little forced. Jack knew him well enough to pick up on it. "If I don't want to be as grey as you, I probably shouldn't have helped you drop that V8 in there, huh?"

"Sure, kid," Jack said easily, as though his heart wasn't absolutely hammering in relief that Mac hadn't decided to just be Alan Green or Foster Adams or whoever the hell and relocate to Poduck, Mississippi or something to sell cars for the rest of his life. "Which Apple store?"

"I'm at The Grove," Mac answered. "Meet you across the street from there so you don't have to try crossing traffic?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure, good idea," Jack said distractedly, deciding exactly what moves he needed to make to get to the shopping center with minimal traffic problems.

"Thanks," was all Mac said before ending the call.

About fifteen minutes later when Jack pulled up into the nearest parking spot he could find, he couldn't pick Mac out of the crowd, and he started to worry again.

Suddenly, though, his partner was by his open window passing in an iced coffee from Groundwork. "It's got that chocolate crap you like in it," he said, before walking around the car, like this was just any other day, and getting in, drinking what Jack was pretty sure was chai if the smell was any indication.

Jack took a drink of his coffee before setting it in the cup holder in the center console. "Thanks, man, that's perfect." He pulled out into traffic, merging seamlessly in the suicidally tight crush of cars.

"Least I can do for the lift, pal," Mac replied, flashing a small but very genuine smile.

"Any time, bud. I got you." Jack paused, swallowing hard against a lump that was suddenly, unexpectedly in his throat. "You know that right? Like I've always got your back no matter …"

Mac stopped him gently. He couldn't do a big emotional talk right now. "Jack, I know, okay? You don't have to say it. Wookie life debt, right?"

One corner of Jack's mouth lifted almost against his will. How was Mac this okay, this cool? Or was this his usual holding shit together with the spiritual equivalent of bubblegum and paperclips until he got somewhere private?

Time would tell.

Instead of saying anything else, he made another very convincing wookie sound and gave Mac his biggest, cockiest grin.

Mac smiled back at him and then took another drink from his cup, brow creasing a little. After a few minutes, he took another drink and this time Jack didn't have to see his face because he heard him mumble, "Bleh."

"Cold?" Jack asked.

"No, just … decaf. And I don't care what anybody says, it doesn't taste the same."

"I thought it was a little weird that you didn't have a coffee. And decaf tea to boot. Man, did you decide to just flip your whole life upside down this afternoon, or what, bud?" Jack said, teasing, but hoping maybe this was an opening to get Mac talking. Mac just smirked a little, so Jack continued. "You haven't gone vegan on me while I wasn't lookin', too, have ya?"

"Yeah, right. I'm gonna give up Bozer's secret recipe burgers," Mac snickered and shook his head. Then he said a little bit seriously, "I'm actually sort of hoping I'm turning my life right side up, Jack."

He looked Jack's way, but his friend had gone back to looking sort of deliberately at the road.

"I couldn't face decaf coffee so I decided to try tea. I figured the spices would be enough to cover up the fakeness of it, but no such luck."

"Why the decaf?" Jack prodded gently, as he swung onto the private road to Mac's place. They hadn't really talked about where they were going, but Mac hadn't said anything when he took the exit, so he figured he'd made the right call.

Mac shrugged. "Doc gave me prednisone for the whole coughing-and-breathed-in-a-bunch-of-garbage thing. That stuff makes me jittery."

Jack shook his head as he pulled into the parking area.

"Still can't believe you just waltzed into Medical like you hadn't basically told Oversight to go fly a kite about it … and I hadn't had a chance to nag your ear off yet."

He slid the car into park and Mac got out, immediately dumping the offending cup of decaffeinated disappointment. He leaned against the top of the car, resting his elbows there, empty cup still held casually in one hand.

"I know how much junk I inhaled … I'm not an idiot, Jack."

"I'm the last guy on Earth who'd ever suggest such a thing. But you …" he trailed off as both Mac's eyebrows went up.

"Don't like being ordered to put up with being run through every ridiculous test known to man because I stubbed my goddamned toe in the field," he said, a little stridently. "Half the stuff we've been more or less held hostage at Medical for wouldn't even get you consideration for sick call in the Army, Jack. Which makes me think Oversight is the one who's ordered it all the time, not Matty, and maybe he was behind their usual overkill. If he was so damned worried about what happened to me, maybe sending me out to get shot at and blown up, and to jump out of planes and climb up buildings with vacuum cleaner suction devices, or get kidnapped by crazy fucking assassins, wasn't exactly the career path he should have steered me into!"

Okay, some real emotion, just not the one Jack was expecting. "Mac, I know it doesn't make much sense," Jack began.

"No, it doesn't make _any_ sense," Mac said, his voice losing its heat and becoming more tired and plainly frustrated. "C'mon, man, let's just go inside … Unless you need to go back to ..?"

"Takin' a personal day, kid. I crashed a truck in Mexico, or didn't you notice?"

"Are you okay?" Mac asked, starting around the car, clearly concerned.

Jack waved him off. "Course I am. Like you said, wouldn't even get me half a day's sick call, bud. Just, what's the boss gonna say?"

Mac grinned. "I appreciate you picking me up. I felt a little stupid walking out of there with no phone, no car … but there was no staying."

Mac glanced around outside, looking up at the trees, the power poles, the street cam visible from where he was, then just started inside. Jack jogged a few steps to catch up. "Why did you leave your phone, bud? Ri and I got worried you were gonna just … I dunno … Go underground or something."

Mac broke out laughing. "I just said I'm not stupid. I have to remind you I'm not crazy, too?" Jack cocked an eyebrow. "The phone belongs to Phoenix, Jack. I wasn't going to take it with me."

Jack started laughing a little bit, too, as Mac let them into the house. "I dunno, Mac. I guess we freaked out thinking you were freaking out … I mean, you just went from joking with me about being partners basically from one end of the galaxy to the other to walking out in less than two minutes, and ... you've been with Phoenix for …"

"Too long, buddy." Mac closed the door behind them. He paused. Then he locked it. He looked at the plainly worried expression on Jack's face. He wasn't really ready to talk …

No, he told himself. If that was true, he wouldn't have called Jack for a ride. He would have called an Uber, texted Jack, Ri, Boze, and maybe even Matty that he was fine, and gone home.

If any of them had shown up and he really hadn't wanted to talk, he could have gone and done laps in the pool, gone for a run in the hills, or even just hid out in his room pretending to be sleeping - all tactics he'd used before when he couldn't face something, usually after a tough mission, another near brush with death, or something … something like Zoe.

But he _had_ called Jack. Giving himself a minute, he decided that he wanted Jack to know all of it. If anything could keep something like what happened between Walsh and Oversight from happening to them, it was making sure there were no secrets, making sure they respected each other enough to be honest.

He tilted his head in the direction of the deck. "Grab us a couple of beers, wouldja?"

Jack gave him kind of a funny look, but headed toward the fridge. Mac went out onto the deck, taking his phone out of his pocket. When Jack joined him a few minutes later, Mac was just finishing a call. "Yeah, that's perfect. No, I've got the app. I'll meet the driver at the door." He hung up and looked up at Jack who was standing there, sort of studying him. "What?"

"Whatcha doin' kid?"

"Ordering us pizza. It's getting late," Mac said matter-of-factly, slipping his phone back into his jeans pocket and squatting down on the deck to start their fire.

Jack sat down near Mac, in one of the chairs. He wasn't injured by any stretch of the imagination, but now that he'd slowed down a little some soreness from knocking those cartel guys around, crashing the the truck, and, oh yeah, riding on horseback for a long damned while for the first time in a couple decades was starting to creep in. He thought if he got down on the floor, he'd never get back up.

Mac reached out a hand, crooking his fingers slightly. Jack chuckled and passed Mac a beer. Mac reached into his pocket for his knife. "Sonofabitch," he grumbled. He half-turned and looked apologetically at Jack. "I forgot … I lost the knife you gave me … the cartel guys took it and …"

Jack took the beer back from Mac and popped the top off, using the arm of the Adirondack chair for leverage. "Birthday's comin' up, ain't it? I'll get you another one. Until then, improvise."

Mac grinned and took a swig of the beer. Jesus, it really was good to be home, to be doing something normal after the last day and a half. And nothing was more normal than having a beer with Jack out here as the dark crept over the city.

Mac returned his attention to the fire. Jack studied his profile in silence. There was a lot going on in those blue eyes, but, there was none of the strange tension that had been in Mac's posture since he caught up with him at that trailhead almost two days ago.

"Am I gonna be eatin' that pizza all by myself, or you really gonna join me?" he asked, trying to keep his tone light, but still worried enough that it wasn't an entirely successful effort.

"You kidding? I'm starving." Jack made his skeptical face, so Mac gave him a real honest look for a minute. "Dude, Oversight had me in my head enough over the years to miss a lot of meals. Not anymore. Seriously. I will fight you for my half," Mac replied, making every effort to just be himself, even taking another drink of beer, before giving a frustrated huff at the reluctant fire.

He got up, putting the beer on the table near Jack and went inside to grab his torch, which was maybe cheating, but it was also fun, and totally got the job done. He needed to walk around for a minute anyway.

When he came back out, he marked the way Jack's eyes were following him. "Jack, I'm okay. I mean, not really …" He sat down cross legged next to the fire and started using the poker to move around the smoldering pile. It was easier with his back to Jack again. "Some of the things he said … I'm still having a hard time with, but it's … It's better now that I know. I always wondered if it would be, you know?"

Jack cleared his throat. Mac's voice was a little tight, but he actually sounded reasonably okay. Jack wanted to believe it, but he wasn't sure if he did. "Actually, I really don't, bud. I can't even imagine what you're going through. What …" he stopped. He shouldn't ask.

"He never answered me when I asked him why he'd steered me into the life."

Mac glanced back over his shoulder, away from his task.

"He told me he left to protect me. I pushed back about it," he told his partner, his voice matter of fact. "Then he said, because I looked like her, looking at me made him angry, and that was why he really left."

"That son of a …"

"No, it's good, Jack. Because that's such a bullshit answer. When he said it, it hurt, of course it did, I think that's why he said it. Just another one of his tests. At least now I know what kind of person …"

Mac trailed off and turned back toward the fire, just in time to catch a facefull of smoke, which he knew instinctively was going to suck beyond the telling of it, even before the inevitable fit of coughing started.

Jack raised an eyebrow when Mac looked at him again. Mac shook his head and poked at the fire a little more. He thought it was probably going to catch now, so he moved back and sat in the chair next to Jack. "Quit looking at me like that, man. I'm good."

Jack shook his head. "I'd like to pretend to believe you, kid, but I'm having a hard time buying it. Mentally or otherwise. As far as the stuff with your father …"

"There's nothing to be done for that, Jack. But … Nothing, nevermind."

Jack frowned at him for a minute. "Okay," he hedged. "How about the 'otherwise' then? You bring home anything for your respiratory misery?"

Mac shook his head. "I kinda wish I had though."

Jack frowned. "No reason you couldn't give the doc a call and …"

Mac actually smiled, sort of apologetically, at Jack. "I kinda can't. I quit, remember? No infirmary for me. Actually … no health insurance … no paycheck …" He trailed off for a minute then started laughing.

"What's so funny about no means of support and the lack of an ability to just turn around and get yourself some decent cough medicine, if you don't mind my asking?"

Jack asked, trying to sound disapproving, but starting to pick up on the genuine amusement in Mac's voice.

"Not exactly funny I guess … Just … For the first time … I was gonna say since I enlisted, but really maybe for the first time in my life … I'm gonna wake up tomorrow and no one's gonna order me to go somewhere or do something. No one's gonna turn a simple conversation into a pass fail test." His face grew serious. "No one is going to look at me as an experiment, trying to control the variables of my life in the hopes of producing some outcome I haven't been consulted about."

"Jesus," Jack breathed. "That's why you walked isn't it?" Mac turned to look at him fully, a questioning expression on his face. "Not that he left, or even his bullshit about being angry because you look like your mom … It's what he said about … how the hell did he put it … nudging you in the right direction … pairing us up … all that …"

"Like a rat in a maze … just hitting that button hoping it's for food and not the one that'll trigger high voltage … Yeah." The reply was quiet, full of pain, and still laced with a fair amount of real anger.

Jack hadn't even thought of that. For a guy who liked control as much as Mac did, finding out someone had been pulling strings like that … that had to feel like … well, probably a lot like he'd felt being held captive by Murdoc last year. And walking away from it had to feel a little something like escape.

"I'm not going to be some project of his," Mac said, his voice still hard. "I think … I think I always was." He sighed. "And I thought finding him would answer some questions, but I don't believe anything he said now … all I have is more questions."

Jack frowned. "If he wasn't going to tell you anything real … why would he have led you to him?"

Mac had forgotten Jack didn't know that part yet. "He didn't. It was Matty."

"What!?" Mac just nodded. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. I am." He sighed suddenly, and to Jack, it sounded a little ragged. "The worst part is I still don't know what all those little clues really meant, what she really knows … And now … I'm not even sure he didn't want to be found … the timing just feels too convenient … and it almost convinced me to stay … and …"

"What do you mean by convenient?" Jack edged forward in his seat.

"I don't know if I even know," Mac said with a frustrated sigh. "But he said lots of little things … had so many pat, prepared, evasive answers … And he sort of made it clear that this was another test … and he was so pleased, so approving when I did what he wanted and so cold, so disappointed when I didn't … I felt about nine years old again … I don't trust him Jack. And I still …"

Mac's phone chimed then and he got up, fishing out his wallet as he headed for the front door. Jack's immediate urge was to follow, but he thought helicopter parent wasn't what Mac wanted or needed right now. He needed his partner, his sounding board, the guy he'd go so far as to pretending was there if they were separated on a mission.

Mac came back a couple of minutes later, this time carrying the rest of the six pack that had been in his fridge in one hand, along with two large pizzas balanced against his side. He let the top one slide into Jack's waiting hands. "Had 'em run that one through the barnyard for you." He grinned at Jack's pleased smile. "By which I mean it's mostly covered with _one_ animal - in all its very best forms."

"Sure, Mac," Jack laughed. "Some magical animal." He fished out a perfectly greasy slice, appreciating the ham, bacon, and sausage scattering the top. "Hey, no, there's some cow on here, too; I see meatballs."

Mac laughed, putting down the six pack and his own pizza box on the floor boards, with a slight wince.

"You really okay, man? I didn't exactly get the full rundown on what happened while you were off with Oversight."

Mac grabbed a civilized slice of pizza ( _cheese, just cheese, like seriously what was wrong with people?_ ) and a fresh beer, which he popped open with the bottle opener he'd retrieved from his junk drawer. He eased back in the chair.

"I've got a couple cracked ribs," he shrugged. Taking in Jack's immediate self-recrimination he hurried to add, "Not new, probably happened either in Puerto Rico or Pakistan. And before you freak out and start doing the helicopter dad thing I can tell is killing you to keep under wraps, I had X-rays today and I'm okay."

Jack chewed his lip. "Helluva time to ditch your health insurance, kid."

Mac laughed again before cramming several satisfying bites of pizza in his mouth and chasing them with beer. "While we're on the subject," Mac said, actually smoothly changing it as he finished his slice, "You're too damned old to be without yours. Insurance, I mean. So don't go quitting your job on my account. I can tell what your thinking, Jack. Don't pretend you're not."

Jack, who was mildly disconcerted by the fact that Mac was already wolfing down his second slice of his usual boring cheese pizza and he was still picking at his first, forced himself to take a bite, chew, swallow, and take a drink of beer, before he answered.

"I guess maybe it crossed my mind," he admitted. "Finding out he screwed with your life, and that he did it to mine too, and now you're done with Phoenix, and Matty led you to your dad, and …"

"It's a lot," Mac finished his slice, the uncharacteristically wiped his hands on his pants. "But I didn't tell you guys I was going to talk to Matty about everything for the same reason I'm bringing this up now …"

He sighed, coughed into the crook of his elbow, wishing like hell he'd just quit when he'd found Oversight, instead of getting shoved around, shot at, and winding up with a chest full of caustic smoke to add to the sore ribs he'd been pretty sure were a little busted even before the doc insisted on a chest X-ray earlier. And wishing even more that he could unhear everything Oversight had said, unthink all the worrying little things tying themselves into knots in his head, like the Christmas lights all tangled in his attic after hastily putting them away after Cage had been shot and he and Jack had once again faced the Ghost.

"Go on, kid," Jack prompted quietly, starting to see some cracks in Mac's 'I'm okay' facade.

Mac took a slow careful breath. "I'm making an emotional … snap … spur of the moment decision. And I don't want to screw up your lives. You're loyal to a fault, Jack. And I know …" his voice cracked a little then and he cleared his throat like it was just the effects of the smoke, but blinking quickly several times after made that a little harder to sell. "I know you'd do anything for me."

"Damn right I would, kid." Jack said with a firm nod, taking a swig if beer to momentarily cover his own emotional response to Mac's entirely truthful, but vulnerable statement.

"I'm also thinking …" He stopped. He couldn't ask that of Jack … not of anyone.

"Go ahead, Mac. I know you were gonna ask me somethin' so go ahead and ask. You let your ole buddy Jack decide if it's too much for him."

Mac's eyebrow climbed. "How do you know that's what I'm thinking?"

Jack slid his chair around, close enough to reach out and put a hand in Mac's shoulder. "How long have we known each other, Mac? Seven years, now?"

Mac nodded. "Something like that."

"I think maybe I've gotten to know you a little bit. Not that you made that easy."

Mac nodded. He knew just how hard edged he'd been back then, distant, cool, certain the only people worth knowing thought the same way he did, we smart like he was. Jesus, he'd been an awful lot like his father back then, despite all his grandfather's lessons that tried to help him see it.

"I was a lot like him then," Mac said in a low voice, with an almost horrified sense of realization in it. "I still am sometimes."

"No, no you're not," Jack said almost harshly, giving Mac's shoulder a squeeze. "I said what I said in Mexico mostly cause I knew it would get you talking to him. I thought you were finally gonna get some answers, kid. I'm sorry."

Mac found himself clenching his jaw so tightly his teeth hurt. "No, you were right. If I don't see it, I can't change it. And I want to change it. I don't want to be like that," he said, and it was almost a ragged sigh.

"You've changed a lot since I met ya, bud. Maybe that's why I can read you so well. I learned this language right along with ya."

Mac looked away from Jack, who still had a hand on his shoulder, to stare into the fire until that alone could explain the burning watery feeling in his eyes. Another squeeze of his shoulder made him turn back to Jack. "I owe you, you know."

"Mac, you don't owe me a damned thing. It's been my privilege to be your Overwatch and I feel I need to point out that you've saved my ass at least as many times as I …"

Mac shook his head, almost looking away again. "Not that." His lips pressed together until they lost their color, then he looked at Jack again.

"You and Al, I owe both of you." He swallowed hard. "You … you both saw through all my bullshit, all my … damage … and you saw what was good about me …"

His breath hitched then but there wasn't a damn thing he could do to stop it, and now that he'd seen the truth of it, he had to say it.

"You made me want to see it, too. Made me want to be a better man."

A single tear slipped down his cheek then, but he ignored it.

"That's what fathers are supposed to do. And I'm grateful I had you both. That I still have you."

He'd hinted at meaning that earlier at Phoenix, but now he'd said it explicitly. And while it sort of made him want to cry in earnest, it also felt like a knot inside him had loosened and he could breathe properly again.

"Aw, hell, Mac," Jack almost whispered. He got to his feet, pulling Mac with him, and wrapped him in what Boze referred to as a full on Delta Dalton Bear Hug. "That's been a hell of a privilege, too, kid. Even more than tryin' to keep your skinny ass alive."

Mac had been hugging him back, trying not to cry, and that was exactly what he needed. He snickered a little and moved to pull away, but suddenly Jack just squeezed him harder, and Mac could tell Jack was struggling with his own emotions.

"Ow, hey, cracked ribs, remember? They're gonna revoke your Helicopter Parent card if you crush me into needing a trip to the hospital, dude."

Jack let him go, trying to decide if he'd actually hurt Mac or if the kid was just breaking the moment before they were both sobbing like a couple middle schoolers. "Sorry kid," he said with a warm smile when he'd decided it was the latter.

Mac sat back down, moved to pick up his beer, then decided against it. "Thank you, Jack. For all of it," he said in much the same tone he'd spoken to Matty earlier.

"I'm just gonna keep doin' to kid. It's not just a job."

"It's an adventure?" Mac joked, riffing off an old Navy recruitment slogan he'd seen on a poster that belonged to his grandfather, who had said a friend of his had it framed as a joke, but he'd never gone on to explain it.

"It sure as Hell is that, Mac." Jack managed to chuckle then.

Mac was a better man, a better all around person than he had any right to be, Jack thought, and the more he learned about Mac's strange past, the more he thought so. He didn't know how much he, or even Alfred Pena, really had to do with that, but even if it was only a little, he was a damned lucky man, and as proud as any dad should be of a young man like Mac. That the kid's own father didn't seem able to see it bothered him to no end. It made him curious, too.

"So in the spirit of continuing that adventure … what was it you wanted to ask me … about work?"

Mac's eyes widened in surprise. He thought he'd steered them gracefully away from that unintentional slip of the tongue.

"Thought I forgot, didntcha?"

Mac gave him a slight sideways smile. "I was hoping." He paused. "This isn't something I should … This is so much worse than dragging you all over the planet looking for him …"

Jack punched him lightly on the arm. "Am I gonna have to crack a few more of your ribs huggin you before you figure out that was never a problem, never a burden, and the only time I ever had an issue was when you took off without me and almost got your skinny butt killed twice in one week?"

Mac practically flinched at the mention of his fruitless trip to Paris, his abduction by Murdoc, and even more at the memory of the drug-addled dreams he'd had afterward of Murdoc killing Jack before he'd even had a chance to apologize for the things he'd said in Paris. But he just nodded. "I know, but … I need to keep looking at the clues Matty sent me, to keep investigating my father …"

"Investigating?" Jack asked, feeling even slower on the uptake today than Mac usually unintentionally made him feel. "What for? You found him."

"But I don't know why he really left, don't know why he manipulated my life and yours, don't know … well, this KX7, Jack … the video I saw … He said he never tested it on anyone, that it was all Walsh but … even though he was paging through those files fast … there was so much data there … I don't believe him." Jack's jaw dropped a little, but Mac went on. "And compounds like that don't get their designations randomly. If there's a KX7, there was probably a one through six too."

Mac shook his head and closed his eyes, trying to get the image of that unwilling test subject, that murder victim, out of his head. He folded his arms, gripping his elbows, trying to also shake the idea that in his own life, everything had always been a test with his father. Everything. And today was no different. It made him feel like an unwilling subject, too.

He shivered, despite the warmth of the evening, despite the fire.

He looked Jack in the eye again and said simply, "I need to know."

He paused again.

"And I was going to ask if you'd help me." He hurried on. "I don't expect you to violate security or anything but …"

"I gotchu, kid. Always. If you want me to keep an eye on him, I will." Mac nodded, his gratitude apparent even though he was quiet, staring into the fire again. "Um … Matty asked me to let her know you were okay, but I didn't wanna call her unless …"

"They know I'm home. I'm sure of it."

Jack frowned.

"Remember how fast they had the street cam footage of the Ghost on Christmas?"

Jack frowned more deeply, but nodded. "The day you … well, when … you know …"

"The day Murdoc kidnapped and tortured me for information about his kid and that I still have nightmares about even though I got out before he'd even gotten creative?" Jack flinched. "Didn't seem to bother my father to bring that up repeatedly, Jack. It's okay."

"Okay, yeah. That day," he said, still obviously uncomfortable. "I made the call and they were here so fast it was almost surreal. I mean, they weren't fast enough cuz the trail was already cold and I was sure you were …"

"Hey, pal, you did your best and the minute you knew where I was you were right there, you helped me get home." This time Mac reached out and patted Jack on the back. "Anyway, I've felt watched for a long time. Maybe that's why that hit man who followed me to Paris almost got the drop on me, hell maybe it's even why Murdoc's guys got a piece of me so easily that day. But now I know it wasn't just a feeling. He's been watching me."

"That sounds kinda paranoid, bud."

"He knew I got beat up in that bank, Jack. He knew I got the crap kicked out of me in Pakistan too. Even though neither of us wrote the wall incident into our reports. And that street cam is new. Maybe eight months old." He sighed. "But, I'll give her a call."

"Matty Webber is a hard person to know but …"

"She's one of the good guys," Mac concluded.

He took out his phone and then stepped inside to call Matty and let Bozer know he was okay too. Boze has just texted him once this evening that he'd come home if Mac needed him but he didn't want to bother him if he needed space. Mac assumed that meant he and Leanna had plans but Bozer would never leave him hanging.

He was closing the porch door when Jack heard, "Hey, Matty … No, no I'm fine. Jack's here …"

Jack got up and picked up their pizzas, and the remainder of the six pack, and brought it all inside. He'd just gotten everything put in the fridge when Mac emerged from his room.

"Hey, man," he started, voice sounding a little strained again. "I think I'm gonna grab another shower. I still smell like smoke. Then I might just crash. I've got a lot to sleep on, you know?"

Jack eyed him speculatively. "Mind if I crash too? On your couch, I mean? Probably shouldn't drink and drive."

Mac smiled. It was tired, and it was a little sad, but it also said that he appreciated Jack's offer that he not be here alone despite the fact that the beer and a half Jack had wasn't enough to even give him a buzz, say nothing about putting him anywhere near the legal limit. "Sure, pal."

Mac moved to head into his bathroom. Then he turned back. He was probably going to have a little private cry in the shower to bleed off some of the residual stress and emotion anyway. "I know we've discussed how we don't say this stuff but … Thanks again. I meant what I said about you and Al. I love you, man.

Jack couldn't let Mac get too far into his own head, even if those words were pretty great to hear. Giving the impression his best shot, he tossed back the ubiquitous Star Wars quote. "I know."

Mac was almost surprised into laughing. "I thought we agreed you were the Wookiee?"

"I am a man of many talents." Then he grinned and did his best Chewbacca call. "That happens to be Wookiee for the feeling is mutual, bud."

Mac grinned and went to shower. When he came out, no longer feeling like going to bed and pretending to sleep, he headed back into the living room to ask Jack if he wanted to watch The Holy Trilogy, but found that Jack had dozed off on the couch. He quietly found the remotes and cued the movie up on his Amazon video app, careful to keep the volume low.

He felt like tonight he could really relate to Luke. He'd found his father, but it was so different, so much more painful than he'd expected. And like Luke when the Empire had razed Uncle Owen's farm, everything he'd ever known, his livelihood, was gone, in a way.

But also like Luke, Mac had good friends, people who were his family more surely than anyone he might share genes with. He also didn't have to run away somewhere or eke out an existence haphazardly. He had his home, money to live on from his mother and grandfather that he'd saved for a rainy day, and by some miracle, even though he'd quit his job, he still had his partner, the world's best helicopter parent and faithful friend, Jack Wyatt Dalton. Which was pretty great, even though his snoring made it hard to hear the movie.

He knew only one thing with any certainty right now. That his future was uncertain. But he had to try to find out the truth, even though he thought it was statistically unlikely he would accomplish his goal.

He sat contemplating that as the room grew darker, until all the light that was left was the flickering bluish one cast by the television. Then a favorite moment came up on the screen, just as Mac was starting to really brood about the likelihood of him ever having anything but more questions as it related to his father.

Han Solo said it, but Mac would have sworn it was spoken in Jack's voice.

"Never tell me the odds."

As Mac's own eyes drifted closed while the movie played on, he found he felt more relaxed, better than he had in a long time.

Sure, he still had questions, suspicions.

But he would find answers.

One way or another.

And he wouldn't have to do it alone.


End file.
